March 13, 2008

By By Mark Russell, Seoul

Soribada, South Korea's top P2P music service provider, claims it has received approval from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism to launch a legal subscription-based P2P music-download service May 1.

A Soribada spokesperson explains that the company has not yet determined subscription rates. The Seoul-based service claims its current service has some 700,000 subscribers and reported sales of $29 million and an operating profit of $3.9 million in 2007.

Founded in 2000, Soribada at one point had 15 million registered users, but a series of copyright-related lawsuits by record labels and other rights-holders forced the company to seek alternative revenue models.

"We have an ambitious plan to extend the sphere of our P2P-based music download service business beyond Asia, to Europe and North America," said Sean Yang, Soribada CEO and co-founder, in a statement.

Soribada claims to have licensing deals with almost all local labels, with the notable exception of Seoul Records, which is owned by SK Telecom -- Soribada's main rival in the online space.

Among foreign labels, Soribada says it has a deal with Universal Music and that it is about to close deals with Sony BMG, EMI and Warner Music.

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