Lively Runs Out Of Money, Suddenly Shuts Down
In January I was writing about Lively's $2 million round of investments bringing their total funding to $2.65 million. Yesterday GeekWire revealed that Lively had suddenly shut down and laid off almost 22 employees because they "just ran out of time." In this case time really does equal money. Lively couldn't raise more funding for their service that facilitates audio and video recording of live shows to be delivered after the show.
The concept of recording and delivering live shows to fans who might want to remember a great night out makes a lot of sense on the face of it but making that happen requires a lot of steps.
Geekwire spoke with CEO Dean Graziano about the shutdown. He said in addition to not being able to raise additional funding, Lively faced licensing issues which were proceeding slowly.
Switchcam faced related issues with their video product for recording live shows. A major problem seems to be less about willingness and more about there being no system in place to facilitate this exact kind of licensing so it becomes an extra problem no one wants to deal with.
I'm sure it's more complicated than that but adding a complicated requirement to a business experiment is often what kills the experiment.
The interview with Graziano yielded a couple of poignant quotes:
“The music business, and it is no secret, no one is making any money…It is tough to make money when you don’t own the content.”
"The music space is definitely not for the faint of heart."
No, it's not.
More:
- Lively Raises $2 Million For Concert Recordings Available After The Show
- Live Music and Video Sales App Lively Closes $500,000 Seed Round
- Lively Launches Concert Recording & Sales App
Hypebot Senior Contributor Clyde Smith (@fluxresearch) also blogs at DanceLand. Send news about music tech startups and services, DIY music biz and music marketing to: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.
