Jenkatehdas is a music start-up from Finland that's been operating in stealth mode for about nine months but publicly released their service this September. The company describes itself as a Finland's first online rock venue: they host exclusive live concerts in a rented studio and stream it in real time. The audience needs to purchase tickets to be able to view the show (4-5€) and can interact with the band by signing into the chat room on the website using Facebook credentials. Yesterday Jenkatehdas streamed their  second third concert ever with Jukka Poika & Sound Explosion Band. Antti Eronen, founder and CEO, did not disclose the number of people watching the show but said he was "really happy with the number of tickets sold, since they were in triple digits". Most of the viewers stayed for over 50% of the show. All the more impressive given that the show was targeted primarily for the Finnish audience (all ads were in Finnish and the band is best known in Finland) and that the start-up is mere months old.

Live streaming concerts is not a novelty - TV operators and many online services often stream performances from venues. However, few if any actually host their own concerts, stream those and offer live and personal interaction with the band. This is what makes Jenkatehdas' concept interesting but tricky - the company needs to offer more value than other operators to attract real interest. So far Jenkatehdas has been doing this by growing a community around their service and focusing on a specific variety of music genres: rock, underground, reggae among others. Given that the audience actually paid to watch the latest show, there is interest out there for this kind of service.

At the moment the start-up is bootstrapped by Antti and the rest of the team: Jussi Pöntynen and Lassi Eronen. All three guys have backgrounds in both IT and music. "We have our product ready, now waiting for it to be packaged in a tighter and neater wrapping", says Antti. The team is currently discussing with multiple potential partners about online and licensing co-operation as well as looking for a VC or business angel to start doing weekly shows and attract more sponsorships and licensing deals.

Despite the positive feedback and sheer coolness of the start-up, Jenkatehdas so far occupies a tiny space in a huge market. While tech-savvy Finns with wide-spread and reliable Internet connections seem to be loving what the company does, it's too early to say the same about the rest of the Europeans. Though young people from Russia, Czech Republic, Poland or Germany might soon prove me wrong.