Rights holders to benefit from online distribution service.(News)

Richard Bron, son of Bronze Records founder Gerry Bron, is close to unveiling an ambitious project aimed at enabling rights owners to control and profit from the online distribution of their content.

Bron has been developing the Open Royalties Gateway (ORG) project through his software development company Blueprint for the past three-and-a-half years and is currently recruiting high-profile senior record industry and management to back its launch. Already working on the project, which is due to launch in the fourth quarter, is a team that includes former executives from Microsoft and consultancy Accenture.

Even though final details are yet to be confirmed, the ORG's core focus is set to be providing a hosting platform for the secure distribution via web and mobile of content ranging from audio and video downloads through to physical CDs and even merchandise. Although the London-based company will initially focus on music, it is understood that it has plans to extend into other areas of content distribution. It is already understood to have held extensive talks with a leading telco over a potential partnership.

The ORG ...