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MTN to up African music offering

23 June 2011

Pan-African mobile operator MTN has teamed up with Content Connect Africa (CCA), an aggregator and provider of on and off-portal content, to offer a wider variety of African music to its customers across the continent.

Through its deal with CCA, MTN will offer a wide selection of music content, which will be available either as full tracks or caller tunes.

CCA has a substantial catalogue of African musical content by artists in Nigeria, Cameroon, Ghana, South Africa and Kenya – among others. It also has rights to exclusive video content featuring a host of popular African artists, including Hugh Masekela, Fela Kuti and Busi Mhlongo.

Growing demand for digital content

Christian de Faria, MTN's senior vice president for innovation, says there is a growing demand for digital content in Africa: "More and more people in Africa and in the developed world are going online for entertainment content," he said in a statement earlier this month.

"With Africa's mobile penetration now at approximately 50% of the 1-billion population, MTN sees a huge opportunity in music content being delivered on people's mobile handsets via our www.mtnplay.com digital content portal."

He explained that the African consumer, with an estimated spending power of US$1.4-trillion by 2020, has become highly aspirational with a taste for world-class goods and services over the last few years.

Vast catalogue of African music

CCA's vast catalogue includes recording labels such as AS Entertainment, Godfather (specialising in Nigerian content), Al Records (East and West Africa content) and Soulistic Music, which features top DJs like Black Coffee.

"Connect Africa is passionate about music from our continent," said CCA managing director Antos Stella. "We have always strived to be ahead of the pack when it comes to representing African music, offering our artists and labels a bouquet of services from content to marketing, sponsorship and digital management.

"We are delighted to work with MTN Play to deliver this content to the rest of Africa."

SAinfo reporter