Justin
Kalifowitz

At a time when publishers and investors were heavily pursuing music catalogs, Downtown ran the other direction last year when it sold its 145,000-song catalog to Concord for a reported $300 million, furthering the company’s transformation to become the dominant player in the label services field. The change in course fits well with Downtown’s development of royalties collector Songtrust and its acquisitions of distribution platforms Soundrop and CD Baby, as well as the swell of self-distributed artists who have blossomed in the digital music era. Downtown also secured a $200 million credit facility, enabling it to offer advances to partners. From its days as a New York-based publisher, the company has grown to a global entity that employs more than 600, servicing nearly 2 million clients across 145 countries and serving up a catalog of more than 23 million music assets.