Sony Ericsson at work on enhanced PlayNow arena

Sony Ericsson announced plans to roll out an enhanced version of its PlayNow mobile content platform. Scheduled to go live in the second quarter of 2008, the new PlayNow arena promises an expanded content menu combining the PlayNow catalog with search, discovery and acquisition applications like Gracenote's TrackID music recognition service--its premium download catalog will expand to millions of song downloads and thousands of mastertones from major labels BMG, Universal Music Group, EMI and Warner Music Group, with support for MP3 and Windows Media DRM-enabled devices, regardless of manufacturer. Sony Ericsson said mobile games will remain a point of emphasis as well. In addition, consumers will enable access to PlayNow content via over-the-air downloads and sideloading.

Sony Ericsson first introduced PlayNow in February 2004--the service is now available in 32 countries around the world, with annual downloads surpassing the 200 million mark. "With PlayNow arena we are creating a unique mobile entertainment experience open to all," said Sony Ericsson head of content acquisition and management Martin Blomkvist in a prepared statement. "We want to invite as many people as possible to be part of the PlayNow arena by removing as many restrictions as possible."

For more on the revamped PlayNow service:
- read this release [1]

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