Carosa buys Destra’s MP3.com.au Natalie Apostolou, Digital Media
Digital entrepreneur and Destra founder Domenic Carosa has salvaged the founding core asset of Destra, MP3.com.au, the advertising backed music portal he founded 10 years ago.
As flagged by Lexicon Partners and the new Destra board in August, following a four month review of the company, it has decided to exit all of the businesses within the entertainment division as quickly as possible.
Carosa finalised the transaction this week for an undisclosed sum. “It’s a great asset and it has a lot of potential, particularly as music companies are finally embracing the MP3 format – it’s only taken ten years.”
Carosa, who was ousted from digital content company Destra in April said that the portal, which was founded originally as a site for independent artists to post and monetise their music for free, would undergo a strategic review, “focussing on re-energising the business and advertising deals.” Over the last week Carosa has instigated discussions with key stakeholders across music, content and digital distribution areas and claims the response has been very positive.
Along with the assets of the company he has secured former employee Dick Coates as site manager. Carosa concedes that he started the MP3.com.au business ahead of its time, when it was listed on the ASX in May 2000. It was forged with the intent to aggregate content from independent artists on a website, giving them access to users and potential customers, creating an online community of music lovers and Australia’s first legal music download service.
Meanwhile, Destra has also quietly divested discount DVD and CD company Payless Entertainment for an undisclosed sum, to its four management team.
