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International Entertainment News

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

MediaBay Retains MediaTech Capital to Review Strategic Options to Maximize Shareholder Value

MediaBay Retains MediaTech Capital to Review Strategic Options to Maximize Shareholder Value

Company Seeks Opportunities For Growth

CEDAR KNOLLS, N.J., Feb. 7 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- MediaBay, Inc. (NASDAQ:MBAY) today announced that in an effort to maximize shareholder value and further capitalize on the company's proprietary content and evolving digital distribution business, MediaBay has retained MediaTech Capital Partners to assist the company in reviewing and possibly executing a variety of strategic options available to the company.

MediaTech is working with the Company to identify the best strategic alternatives to enable the Company to maximize shareholder value and will help the Company execute on any strategy that may be developed. Working with MediaTech, the Company has determined that one likely aspect of this strategy is to accelerate distribution of the Company's content to wireless markets.

Jeff Dittus, Chief Executive Officer of MediaBay stated, "To accelerate the Company's distribution in the global wireless marketplace our Board of Directors has authorized Management to implement an acquisition program. As part of this strategy, the Company will also evaluate seeking strategic partners that can assist with this strategy and lower our execution risk."

Porter Bibb, Managing Partner of MediaTech said, "We see significant opportunities in the mobile content market and MediaBay has an ideal platform from which to build upon. The entertainment market that the company is in has explosive qualities with new vertical opportunities being presented every day. We will work with the company to identify the most advantageous opportunities and seek to develop a plan to best enhance shareholder value."

In its first year of pursuing its digital strategy, MediaBay has become well positioned to become a leading distributor of its audio entertainment to the US music services via its partnerships with MSN, Real and MusicNet (which currently services some of the webs largest music sites including Yahoo, HMV and Virgin and the soon to be launched MTV service Urge) as well as both US satellite radio companies XM and Sirius.

According to ZDNet, worldwide sales of music via the Internet and mobile phones hit $1.1 billion in 2005, triple of 2004 sales and accounting for 6% of global record company revenues. IFPI said music fans around the globe downloaded 420 million single tracks in 2005, more than double the 156 million downloaded in 2004.

However, digital content marketing and distribution is a global business in its infancy, and to effectively reach this market, MediaBay needs a more aggressive partnering strategy. According to the USA today, 200 million people in China are studying English, and there are projected to be 393 million cell phone subscribers at the end of 2005 in that country, which compares to close to 200 million in the US and 208 million in Europe.

According to Nokia one of the world's leading mobile phone suppliers, global shipments of cell phones should exceed 800 million handsets in 2006, with a growing a number of those classified as smart phones that support advanced multi-media features that combine music and video players seamlessly. Management hopes that its spoken word audio entertainment and educational content will become an important offering to this global user base.

About MediaTech Capital Partners:

Mediatech Capital Partners, under its holding company, Technology Partners LLC, is a private merchant bank established in 1996 to serve developing and established businesses in rapidly evolving media and technology-based industries.

The firm acts as an advisor and business accelerator, often investing its own capital in promising situations, while providing clients with informed advice, assisting in the refinement of new business models, assessing and improving shareholder value, introducing strategic corporate relationships, and creating new value from existing and/or under-realized assets. Through its network of technical specialists and strategic partners, the firm is able to access expert and informed assistance in new media, entertainment, biotechnology, and most areas of the information technology and communications industries.

About MediaBay, Inc.

MediaBay Inc. (NASDAQ:MBAY) is a leading digital media and publishing company specializing in spoken word and premium audio entertainment. The company maintains a library consisting of over 75,000 hours of content, including audio books from best-selling authors and the history of American Radio. Some of MediaBay's digital content partners include BBC, Blackstone, CBS Radio, Harper Collins, Hay House, Oasis, Penguin Audio, Random House, Simon & Schuster, Sound Room, Zondervan. In addition to its popular Audio Book Club, MediaBay distributes its content through proprietary web sites including audiobookclub.com, radiospirits.com and Soundsgood.com as well as through partner channels including MusicNet, MSN Music, Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio. For more information on MediaBay, please visit http://www.mediabay.com/, http://www.audiobookclub.com/, http://www.radiospirits.com/ and http://www.soundsgood.com/.

Certain statements in this press release constitute "forward-looking" statements that involve a number of known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause MediaBay's actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any results, performances or achievements express or implied by such forward-looking statements. All statements other than statements of historical facts included in this press release including, without limitation, statements regarding our future financial position, business strategy, budgets, projected costs and plans and objectives of our management for future operations are forward-looking statements. In addition, forward-looking statements generally can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "may," "will," "expect," "intend," "estimate," "anticipate," "believe," or "continue" or the negative thereof or variations thereon or similar terminology. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations, include, without limitation, our history of losses; our ability to execute on any strategic initiatives; the success of our new digital media distribution strategy, our ability to anticipate and respond to changing customer preferences, license and produce desirable content, protect our databases and other intellectual property from unauthorized access, collect receivables; dependence on third-party providers, suppliers and distribution channels; competition; the costs and success of our marketing strategies; product returns; member attrition and other risks detailed in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2004. Undue reference should not be placed on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof. We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements.

Contacts:
Tim Clemensen
Rubenstein Investor Relations
212-843-9337
tclemensen@rubensteinir.com

Source: MediaBay, Inc.

CONTACT: Tim Clemensen of Rubenstein Investor Relations,
+1-212-843-9337, tclemensen@rubensteinir.com

Web site: http://www.mediabay.com/
http://www.audiobookclub.com/
http://www.radiospirits.com/
http://www.soundsgood.com/

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