Strong Ticketfly growth in 1st year under Pandora

Ticketfly grew year-on-year revenue 25%, to US$86.6 million, in its first full year as a division of Pandora Media.

Bolstered by the addition of several high-profile new partners, including the Mercury Lounge and Bowery Ballroom in New York, independent promoter Jam Productions and a host of venues and promoters in the American south, Ticketfly outpaced growth at Pandora group as a whole, which increased turnover 19% to $1.4 billion.

Ticketing is a key component in Pandora’s (vaguely Soviet-sounding) ‘five-year plan’ to grow revenue to $4bn by 2020. “We will continue to optimise our ticketing capability, bringing unique enhanced functionality to our listeners, while combining our live event sponsorship and our powerful sales team and infrastructure to build towards a $300m-plus revenue opportunity in the next five years,” it reads.

Pandora in June began pushing listeners of its internet radio service – which makes up the bulk of its turnover – to Ticketfly via “hyper-personalised concert recommendations” in a bid to diversify its revenue streams.

“We enter 2017 laser-focused on … an artist-to-fan platform to drive listener engagement and ticket sales”

Despite seemingly steady growth for Pandora, its losses continue to widen, more than doubling to $343m in 2016. Active listeners fell slightly last year, while the cost of paying rightsholders increased by $124m to $734.4m.

Commenting on its 2016 results, Pandora founder and CEO Tim Westergren says: “We made significant progress in 2016 by driving leverage in our core business while accelerating subscriptions to our paid product.

“We enter 2017 laser-focused on the growth of our ad-supported business, the launch and growth of our subscription products and an artist-to-fan platform to drive listener engagement and ticket sales. These three strategic pillars operate in harmony to create mutually reinforcing revenue streams across a large and growing addressable market.”

Pandora bought Ticketfly for $450m in October 2015.

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