Research of Institutions/ Distribution Channels

Universal Music  Group: 

Universal Music is the largest and most powerful major music label in the world, responsible for 29% of the worlds music sales, it was established in 1999 but was supposedly founded in 1934 by Decca Records. It is owned by the  French media conglomerate Vivendi, a mass media company located in Paris which has activities in music, video, film, television and video games. Universal Music has always been a large and rather dominant company as it is a part of Universal pictures, one of the largest film production companies in the entire world. Because of their big status they began to dominate the music market and proceeded to become the biggest record after they purchased EMI, a former British music company, in 2012. Universal Music group currently has over 7,000 employees, with a revenue of over $7 billion and work with some of the biggest A-list artists such as J-Cole, Kanye West  and Ariana Grande. Universal music group also co-developed Vevo,  a site designed for music videos which delivers ad free content and streaming of similar music content. Universal music group currently own a large range of smaller labels such as Island Records and Mercury Records. A record label such as this one generates with a more mainstream and wide demographic targeting all ages as they have signed a number of recognisable names and are a major record company with recognition all over the world. A big competitor for UMG would be Sony Music Corporation as it generates an estimated revenue of $66.5b with over 130,000 employees.

Here are just a few more.

Youtube: 

YouTube is an American video sharing website, it now operates as one of Googles subsidiaries since it was bought by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion. It allows users to share, upload, favourite videos and comment on them which creates a large amount of interaction between audience and creator. The site was created by Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim in 2005. Most content posted to youtube is uploaded by individuals but larger corporations choose to upload content such as BBC and Vevo. Available content includes TV shows, video clips and music videos. As of February last year, at least 400 hours worth of content had been uploaded and over a billion hours of content is watched every day. YouTube allows a place for media corporations to upload and for bands, singers or artists to upload their work in a safe space for free. Here, listeners can listen to their content and enjoy the visuals of a music video at the same time.  More than half of youtube views come from mobile devices, suggesting their most frequent viewers are younger and more technologically able. User Percentage by Age 18-24 – 11%, 25-34 – 23%, 35-44 – 26%, 45-54 – 16%, 50-64 – 8%, 65+ – 3%, unknown age – 14%. YouTubes target market is the broadest of them all with videos on everry category imaginable its impossible to pinpoint a specific targeted audience. This is great for bands posting music videos because it means they are guaranteed to generate listeners and fans.