VNUE Expands Into Key West Market with Soundstr Recognition Tech
VNUE announced that the company is launching an aggressive campaign to deploy its Soundstr Music Recognition Technology in every bar…
VNUE announced that the company is launching an aggressive campaign to deploy its Soundstr Music Recognition Technology in every bar, restaurant, and hotel in Key West, FL, and has brought on local resources to have “boots on the ground” for the rollout.
Key West is one of the most sought-after vacation spots in the world, attracting around five million tourists per year by planes, boats (including cruise ships), and automobiles. It also boasts a large number of businesses that utilize music.
In fact, the famed Duval Street is lined with no less than 143 bars — in less than two miles.
“Key West is the perfect location to start our aggressive rollout,” said CEO Zach Bair. “As a tourism destination, and as a city that relies on tourism, there is a plentiful amount of entertainment spaces centered around music. And for VNUE, having this large concentration of clientele makes a lot of sense in terms of installation and support.”
In order to facilitate the rollout, VNUE has brought on a local resource, Ben Hennington, who will coordinate the installations and sign up and interact with clients.
Soundstr is a cloud-based platform that also includes custom-designed devices, called Soundstr Pulse, which are installed in brick-and-mortar establishments. Soundstr is able to accurately detect both live and recorded music and provides a rich set of data, including but not limited to song name, artist, publisher, writer, and the PROs who are responsible for collecting royalties — something that has not been able to be done previously. This data will help business owners negotiate a fairer license agreement with the performing rights organizations (PROs) such as ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, and GMR, and additionally, the valuable data that VNUE collects will help to ensure that the correct songwriters are being paid.
Interested businesses may receive the Soundstr Pulse devices for no cost whatsoever.
Additionally, in the next six months to a year, VNUE will be offering both playlist functionality — meaning clients will be able to play fully licensed music directly from Soundstr — as well as the ability to opt-in for advertising, which will help to offset licensing costs that businesses pay. One of the strongest differentiators with Soundstr Pulse is that it has high-quality stereo audio output capabilities (for use with advertising and for playlists), as well as Bluetooth beacon technology that will be leveraged for non-invasive advertising.
“What people don’t realize is that a lot of the time, the correct songwriters and artists are not being properly compensated for royalties due, because the performing rights organizations have no idea what is actually being played,” said Bair. “Soundstr solves this problem and also creates a mechanism that we believe will simultaneously help to reduce music licensing costs to licensees, as well as a path for an efficient ‘pay-per-play’ utility model that VNUE has been developing. There are substantial benefits to business owners: lower costs, make sure artists get paid. Be one of the good guys!”
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