August 03, 2009

By By Richard Smirke, London

Warner Music has extended its existing partnership with U.K.-based music store 7digital to sell Warner's Music's catalog across Europe.

Effective immediately, the new deal allows 7digital stores in France, Belgium, Netherlands, Italy and Portugal to sell high-quality MP3 downloads from Warner Music's roster of local and international artists for the first time.

The six new stores join existing 7digital outlets in the U.K., Ireland, Spain, Switzerland, Austria and Germany, which are already stocked with MP3 downloads from the Warner Music catalogue. These eleven stores will be followed by further rollout from 7digital in additional countries across Europe, to be announced at a later date.

Warner Music is the second major to sign a pan-European MP3 deal with 7digital and will allow consumers across Europe to purchase rights-free downloads from Warner artists that can be transferred across any device. EMI has an existing pan-European deal with 7digital which includes DRM-free repertoire.

7digital CEO Ben Drury said in a statement: "The completion of this deal gives us the broadest European reach of any MP3 download store. We have seen a dramatic rise in digital album sales since switching to a 100% MP3 catalog in the U.K. last September and this is a natural progression to that trend."

Warner Music Europe senior VP, digital business Eric Daugan added:"We're pleased to be working with 7digital to further expand access to high quality, interoperable music downloads in Europe."

7digital was established in January 2004 and has distribution partnerships with a variety of digital outlets including Spotify, Last.fm, AOL's WinAmp and the open-source Songbird player.

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