Saregama India Ltd is set to acquire a 10% equity stake in Timbre Media, the same company which provided music programming to satellite radio service WorldSpace, reports afaqs. The exact financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed. Following the investment, the two companies will tie-up to revive the WorldSpace brand in India, and relauch the same set of music channels dedicated to different genres of Indian music, including Jhankaar, Farishta and Gandharv for distribution via Internet, mobile and DTH platforms. While Timbre Media has acquired the exclusive license to use the WorldSpace brand, and will be handling music programming, Saregama will acts as the content provider and distributor for the radio stations. The first channel from the alliance, is scheduled to be launched on the mobile platform in eight weeks, according to a company official. The company is currently in negotiations with various mobile service providers and are working on the pricing. MediaNama readers would recall that WorldSpace had in fact tied-up with Microsoft India to start a paid online radio service in 2007 via MSN Radio. However, the service was pulled back since WorldSpace only had satellite radio rights, and content owners hadn’t licensed them digital (Internet and Mobile) rights. WorldSpace had also mentioned that the Government was finalizing a new satellite radio policy, which was resulting in a delay in re-launching the web service. Will Mobile Radio Work in India? Internet radio or mobile radio has so far met with limited success in the Indian market.…
