Soothing music in the hotel lounge, hip tunes in a bar or a cafe - music in service industry is something we're all used to without paying much attention to it. Providing music seamlessly for hotels, bars and restaurants is not as painless, however. That's something DJ Online discovered and decided to solve by creating a new solution for online media distribution. I talked with Jani Tolonen, CEO and one of the investors, who told me that what their company offers for a service industry is a way to easily manage high-quality music, unify it across customer's chains, offer karaoke and songs on-demand as well as discreetly show audio-visual ads. DJ Online deploys a client machine to connect with their own server over the Internet, where all customer data and artificial intelligence is stored. The music used is licensed through record labels (their cost is included in the price of the service). The service works online and requires a connection with a minimum transfer rate of 2Mb/s. DJ Online downloads the music to be played and stores them on the computer, so any disturbances in Internet connections will not compromise functioning.

DJ Online seems to solve all of the customer pains when it comes to managing music: they provide software and music as well as training for the customers and 24/7 support. It also caters to the audience's needs: hotels guests and restaurant customers can order a specific song with a text message (0,95€/text) and receive back the exact time when the song will be played. The software is now patented in Finland (applications for patent have been issued in USA, Japan and the EU) and the company has pilot customers in Finland and Sweden. They are currently negotiating some deals with partners in Germany; UK would be next.

DJ Online was founded in 2004 by Pasi "Pablo" Harju & Sirkka Ahonen and it currently has 7 employees. Their business model is license-based: clients sign a contract for up to 2 years (so far) and pay monthly fees between 160-600€ depending on their package. DJ Online has so far received 400 000€ investment altogether from about sixteen business angels, including Monty Widenius and Mikko Välimäki. Jani Tolonen said the company is just about to break even and they are also planning to close a small round of investment (up to 70 000€) in the upcoming couple of weeks. VC investment round would be next, though nothing certain was said about that.

Finland is a surprisingly music-oriented nation: it has produced many world-famous artists, karaoke is one of the biggest national hobbies and music-oriented start-ups together with gaming ones comprise probably the biggest sectors in the start-up community in terms of their number. DJ Online is harnessing that expertise for the benefit of the more traditional businesses. Let's hope hotels, bars and restaurants get the vibe.

Image by ViniMan