Major offers total Ricall access.

Online licensing service Ricall has signed a deal with Sony BMG which will see the major placing almost its entire catalogue onto a new, separately branded section of Ricall's website.

As well as significantly expanding Ricall's catalogue of sync licences by adding more than 1m tracks, the deal underlines the increasing efforts by record labels to find alternate revenue streams outside of selling recorded music.

And Ricall says that it is in discussions with all of the other majors - some of which are "at contract stage" - over similar deals to bring their entire catalogues onto the Ricall site for sync licensing.

Sony BMG vice president for commercial markets Pete Leggatt says the move is a sign of the need for diversification. "All of the majors have been increasingly focusing on sync over the past five years. It was something that was under-exploited in the past."

He adds, "It's a good way of driving alternate revenues. Sync licensing is a congested, competitive market. The aim is to gain a larger market share and increase awareness of the Sony BMG catalogue.

"This is another step in our relationship with Ricall, who we consider to be the pre-eminent music search company."

As part of the partnership, music buyers who use Ricall to find and license Sony BMG music for their productions will not be charged a commission or ...