Getty Images has announced sports and music deals that included an extension of its partnership with PGA TOUR and new agreements with Gracenote and Hello Music. Chief executive officer Jonathan Klein announced the digital music deals during a keynote speech at the MIDEM 2010 conference in Cannes, France.
The company remains the exclusive PGA TOUR commercial photo partner. Under a multi-year extension of an existing arrangement, first formed in 2005 between PGA and WireImage, Getty will continue to host and manage the PGA TOUR archive and provide ongoing coverage. The Getty collection also includes coverage of related events, such as the European Tour, the LPGA, the Masters at Augusta National and all other non-PGA TOUR events.
The music deals are less traditional. Getty Images has signed agreements with several digital music providers to allow its array of images and event coverage be integrated into music products and services. This will “help the companies in the digital music industry provide more dynamic and engaging entertainment experiences through relevant visual content,” said the company in a statement.
According to Klein, these new alliances with music companies reflect Getty’s strategy of growing its digital offering. They also reflect the company’s attempts to expand beyond the traditional image user.
During his MIDEM keynote, Klein outlined how the music industry can learn from and adopt the Getty licensing model. Getty licenses a growing collection of music for commercial uses. “Our approach to sync licensing is directly in line with our success in still and moving imagery, where we offer pre-cleared rights for a wide variety of uses and customers on a global scale,” said Klein. “Getty Images’ focus on aggregating independent artists made this approach possible and we were able to offer an extensive catalogue of high quality music to our customers. We continue to explore opportunities to funnel other sources of music through this model, to expand the volume of customers and uses.”