Mobile entertainment provider Jamba has partnered with EMI Music on a deal that will offer DRM-free downloads on mobiles.
The announcement was made today at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Launching the service in Europe first, Jamba says it will ultimately make its complete collection of 1.5 millions songs available entirely DRM-free for mobile handsets. The company says DRM-free music from EMI is set to be rolled-out on all Jamba and Jamster portals in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
The new DRM-free tracks will be sent through a dual delivery system: a higher quality MP3 version will be sent to PCs, while compressed AAC+ files are sent to mobiles, to allow for faster downloading and increased storage capacity.
“Music is now available on mobile devices for everyone, and Jamba is excited to be the first company in Europe to deliver DRM-free music to customers on both the mobile and PC,” says Mauro Montanaro, Jamba CEO, in a statement.
EMI was the first major to introduce DRM-free PC downloads last April. “As the first major music company to make all of our digital downloads available for sale without DRM, EMI’s objective is to deliver more music to more people with the flexibility and ease of use they want,” adds Ian Whitfield, EMI Music’s director digital business development, in the statement.
“With Jamba now offering an even larger catalog of EMI’s downloads to consumers we can continue to drive the digital market further forward.”
Jamba, which is based in Berlin, has made deals with more than 800 content providers around the world. The company is a joint venture between News Corporation and VeriSign.
As previously reported, Jamba and EMI Music struck a deal in Nov. 2006 for the major to supply content for use as realtones and music videos via the Jamba/Jamster portals in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The deal covered heavyweight EMI acts including the Rolling Stones, Coldplay, Depeche Mode, Queen and Robbie Williams.
