O2 X Awards for innovation in business move closer.

O2 has teamed up with Music Week to promote the O2 X Awards, a national celebration of the best small and innovative music businesses. Here we profile Sync Inc, a company with the potential to pick up the #10,000 prize money

With revenues from recorded music sales continuing to decline, sync deals are becoming an ever more vital revenue stream for the music business, something Sync Inc founders Matt Kaleda and Dave Philpot have long recognised.

But while major record labels often have a team of specialist personnel working hard to place music in TV programmes, adverts, films and computer games, smaller independent labels do not usually have the resources to maximise the sync potential of their catalogues.

"There's so much great music out there on these small `one-man show' indie labels, who don't have the manpower or contacts to exploit their catalogue to the creative broadcast industry," explains Kaleda. "We thought there was a gap in the market and, by using our contacts and knowledge, we could help these smaller indies get their music out to the movers and shakers in the film, TV and advertising worlds."

Look at the backgrounds of the duo behind Sync Inc and it would appear that the decision to team up was a match made in heaven.

Along with spells at Ninja Tune and Warner Music, where he placed music in numerous ads for brands such as BMW and Mazda, Kaleda's background includes a period as music supervisor for BBC TV dramas such as Life On Mars, Spooks and EastEnders.

Meanwhile, Philpot has been with Brighton-based Skint and Loaded Records since 1997 and while overseeing the company's licensing and digital deals helped steer Fatboy Slim into the Guinness Book of Records ...