Thumbplay Music Surpasses Half Million Mobile App Downloads

NEW YORK, Oct. 13 /PRNewswire/ -- After only a few months on the market, more than a half million people in the United States have downloaded the Thumbplay® Music™ cloud-based, streaming music service (www.thumbplay.com) to their smartphones.  The popular, feature-rich app has been publicly available on all three Android™, Apple® and BlackBerry® smartphone platforms since June 2010.  Thumbplay Music was the first of its kind to launch on all three major U.S. platforms and continues to be available on more devices than any other comparable service.   It is also available for PCs/Macs.

Said Evan Schwartz, CEO and Co-Founder of Thumbplay: "Having more than 500,000 downloads under our belts at this early stage is a testament to the desire for people to have anytime, anywhere access to an unlimited music catalog.   In addition to our focus on mobile, we are bringing the same great music experience to their living rooms with the launch of Thumbplay Music on connected TVs in early 2011."

Thumbplay has also released some early key usage and demographic data:

• Nearly 70% of Thumbplay Music users are male
• The largest user group is 25 – 34-years-old, followed closely by 35 – 44-year-olds
• 90% of the music is streamed to smartphones vs. PCs/Macs
• 95% of the music streamed is from Thumbplay's long tail catalog (that is, individual songs outside Thumbplay's Top 20 most-played songs)

Thumbplay Music usage ranking by platform (June 1 – October 1, 2010):

1. Apple® – 39%
2. BlackBerry® – 36%
3. Android™ – 25%

Top 5 devices playing Thumbplay Music (in rank order, June 1 – October 1, 2010):

1. iPhone®
2. BlackBerry® 8530™
3. iPod Touch®
4. Motorola™ Droid™
5. BlackBerry® 8520™

With today's announcement, Thumbplay Music continues to be at the forefront of the mobile content space, as the number of U.S. mobile music listeners is expected to more than double by 2014.*  Thumbplay serves the rapidly growing market of U.S. smartphone users which is forecasted to grow to 160 million people by 2013.**

With more than ten million tracks under license from all major labels and more than 35,000 independent labels, Thumbplay Music is a next generation music service, built by experts in mobile content delivery. In addition to an in-app media player, Thumbplay Music boasts several compelling features, including:

• Unlimited, on-demand access to any artist or album; choose from millions of songs.
• iTunes® Playlist/Favorite Artist Import within Thumbplay Music's companion desktop app.  With a few clicks, recreate iTunes playlists and have them available on your smartphone and PC/Mac.
• Genie for music discovery: Instantly generate customized recommendations from select songs – it's a great way to quickly build playlists that you know you're going to love while discovering new music.
• Favorites and effortless Playlist creation to quickly build your personal collection; auto-syncs between smartphone and PC/Mac.
• Online and offline access: No connection? No problem!  Listen to music on the subway or in-flight.  Available anytime, anywhere for Android, BlackBerry and iPhone.
• Music Sharing – Stream songs live on Facebook from PC/Mac:  Select "Share" by right-clicking on any of the millions of songs within Thumbplay Music's desktop app. Share music with specific friends or with everyone in your Facebook network – also coming soon for Twitter™;
• Search: Find music by artist, song, album or genre; includes free previews of all songs
• Free, "no strings attached" three-day trial; subscriptions are then available for $9.99/month.

Thumbplay, which enjoys sustained profitability, has built an award-winning service centered on delivering millions of pieces of mobile content to 95 percent of U.S. devices among every major carrier. Thumbplay is leveraging its existing network of more than 8,000 distribution partners to promote Thumbplay Music. Click on the following link to watch a video demo of the app running on all platforms: http://bit.ly/b27GTY.

* A study by eMarketer (2010) estimates that the numbers of mobile music listeners to more than double to 52.2 million by 2014

**A study by Yankee Group (2009) estimates that the number of smartphone users is set to quadruple to 160 million by 2013.

ABOUT THUMBPLAY

Thumbplay, Inc. is the leading mobile entertainment provider in the U.S.  Thumbplay Music, the company's cloud-based, streaming music service for every major smartphone platform and PCs/Macs has more than 10 million songs under license.  Thumbplay.com features content from some of the world's largest entertainment companies, including: EMI, Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group, among many others. Headquartered in New York City, Thumbplay was founded in September 2004. Investors include Bain Capital Ventures, SoftBank Capital, i-Hatch Ventures, Redwood Partners, New Enterprise Associates, Meritech, Brookside Capital Partners and Cross Creek Capital. More information can be found at www.thumbplay.com or at m.thumbplay.com from a mobile phone.

For a complete list of smartphones supported by Thumbplay: http://www.thumbplay.com/devices.

All trademarks property of their respective owners. No partnerships implied.

SOURCE Thumbplay, Inc.