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Rallying call for Festicket creditors

Promoters owed money by collapsed festival package company Festicket are being urged to contact administrators ahead of Friday’s (2 December) deadline.

The London-headquartered event discovery and booking platform had debts of more than £22.5 million when it went bust in September. Six firms were each owed in excess of £1m, with a further 20-plus creditors owed six-figure sums, according to documents filed with Companies House.

Administrator ReSolve Advisory said previously that despite several promoters being under the impression the cash from their ticket sales would be ringfenced by Festicket, that does not appear to have happened.

“We have received communication from a number of promoter creditors who are asserting that the net realisations from their ticket sales were to be held in trust for them by the company,” it said. “Our understanding is that the company did not segregate or ringfence any assets for the benefit of specific parties.”

At the request of administrators, the Insolvency and Companies Court has ordered that any creditor asserting that its monies were held on trust by Festicket should notify administrators of its “trust claim” along with an estimate of its value by no later than 4pm on 2 December. Following an initial meeting on 17 November, a second directions hearing is expected to take place at the London court on 9 December.

“If you were led to believe the money from the sale of your events was to be held on trust by Festicket then you must notify the administrators by the aforementioned deadline”

A letter circulated around the industry, seen by IQ, puts the number of promoters owed money by Festicket as “at least” 105, “some of whom are asserting trust claims whilst others are suggesting they are simply creditors”.

“If you were led to believe the money from the sale of your events was to be held on trust by Festicket (or any of its other trading names) then you must notify the administrators by the aforementioned deadline,” it adds. “Any such respondent must also notify the administrators if you intend to attend the second directions hearing and whether you intend to oppose or support the main application.

“Please provide any such information to [email protected] as soon as possible and in any event by the deadline.”

Any promoter wishing to join current and potential future litigation is advised to email [email protected].

Founded in 2012 by Zack Sabban, Jerome Elfassy and Jonathan Youne, Festicket also ran offices in the US, the Netherlands, Germany, Portugal, France and Australia. The company, which acquired Event Genius and Ticket Arena in 2019, recorded losses of approximately £11.3 million and £8m in the 2019 and 2020 financial years, respectively.

US-based ticketing exchange Lyte acquired Festicket and Event Genius assets for £100,000 in September and pledged to protect Festicket employees and find “ways to reconcile and rebuild with affected promoter clients”.

 


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ILMC announces Futures Forum, London Calling

The International Live Music Conference (ILMC) has heralded the return of Futures Forum, a one-day discussion for the next generation of live music industry leaders.

Created and shaped by young professionals, the event brings together the executives that currently define the business with the emerging stars who are driving its evolution.

Futures Forum launched in 2019 and also took place in 2020, with keynote interviews with Dua Lipa and her father Dugi, as well as Team Mumford & Sons (Lucy Dickins, Ben Lovett and Adam Tudhope).

The 2023 edition will continue to experiment with non-traditional conference formats, mixing connected discussions with immersive workshops, peer-to-peer networking and TED-style ‘Soapbox’ presentations by thought leaders.

Also returning are the career-boosting mentoring sessions that proved a highlight of previous events. The one-on-one meetings provide a rare opportunity for Futures delegates to meet face-to-face with some of the most successful figures in live music.

The agenda is once again being steered by our Futures council – made up of some of the most exciting young executives in the industry – alongside affiliated associations, the ILMC agenda team and the IQ editorial team.

The council comprises Alexandra Ampofo (Metropolis Music, UK), Clara Cullen (Music Venue Trust, UK), Dotun Bolaji (Runway Artists, UK), Flo Noseda (Wasserman Music, UK) and Kedist Bezabih (Goodlive Artists, DE).

London Calling is a ‘first-of-its-kind’ central London showcase featuring some of the best emerging artists in the world

Plus Nastassja Roberts (Dreamhaus, DE), Seny Kassaye (For Agency, CA), Stella Scocco (Södra Teatern, SE), Théo Quiblier (Takk, CH), Will Holdoway (Method Events, UK) and Zoe Williamson (UTA, US).

Futures Forum will take place on the last day of ILMC (3 March 2023) at its new location, the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London. Passes for the one-day event start from £149. For more information or to buy tickets, click here.

ILMC has also announced a new major feature on the Wednesday evening (1 March) of the 2023 conference.

London Calling is a ‘first-of-its-kind’ central London showcase featuring some of the best emerging artists in the world.

The showcase will take place in multiple venues across Soho, just minutes from the Royal Lancaster, featuring artists carefully curated by a select number of cultural bodies and companies.

Early supporters of the night include Mad Cool Festival, Music Venue Trust’s Revive Live programme, Gigseekr and ILMC’s Latin Live partners, Loud and Live, Grandmove, and OCESA. ILMC delegates will have access to all London Calling shows.

ILMC Spa & Last Resort will welcome over 1,200 of the world’s top live music professionals from over 40 countries to the recently upgraded Royal Lancaster Hotel in London from 28 Feb–3 March 2023.

Full information about the conference is at 35.ilmc.com.

 


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Italy’s live biz reports ‘significant recovery’

Italy’s live music industry is seeing a “significant recovery” since returning from the pandemic, according to newly released data.

The Italian Society of Authors and Publishers (SIAE) presented the concert statistics for the first nine months of 2022 as part of the sixth edition of Milan Music Week, which was held from 21-27 November.

Despite a 19% decrease in shows compared with the last pre-Covid year of 2019, the SIAE reports a 6% increase in attendance this year along with a 22% increase in box office spending.

The total number of shows held from January to September 2022 was 24,119 with 13,013,269 admissions, while spending at the box office totalled €450.6 million with an average ticket price of €35.

For the same period in 2019, however, the number of shows was 29,951 with 12,263,624 admissions. Box office takings were €369.4m with an average ticket price of €30.

“The first elaborations of the SIAE data for 2022 confirm a significant recovery especially in the concert sector”

Events staged at open-air venues fared particularly well, with the biggest concert being Italian singer-songwriter Vasco Rossi’s performance at Trentino Music Arena in Trento, which attracted a reported 111,881 fans.

SIAE attributes the upturn to a younger audience “more willing to frequent crowded places”, but acknowledges the boom is partly due to dates rescheduled from 2020 and 2021, for which tickets had already been sold.

The organisation’s general director Gaetano Blandini notes that while the figures are encouraging, the live business still requires assistance from the authorities to fully return to its former glory.

“The first elaborations of the SIAE data for 2022 confirm a significant recovery especially in the concert sector,” says Blandini. “These are positive signs that bode well, but to complete the crossing of the desert the help of the State with targeted interventions, tax incentives and other measures that give companies the opportunity to invest in technology and security [is needed] to overcome the challenges of the future.”

Speaking to IQ last month, Adolfo Galli, co-founder of Italian promoter D’Alessandro e Galli, said the public’s appetite for live shows had not waned since the pandemic-enforced break.

“People are buying tickets,” he said. “Lucca Summer Festival this year, which was the first one we’ve managed to do since Covid, did incredibly well. We sold almost 140,000 tickets and most of the shows were sold out.

“We have sold a lot of tickets for all of our shows this year, including Eric Clapton in October, our Elton John show at San Siro Stadium, which sold out – 50,000 tickets – and the Rolling Stones show also in Milan – 57,000 tickets.”

Subscribers can read IQ‘s recent market report on Italy here.

 


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Roskilde, Primavera and more reveal 2023 lineups

Primavera Sound, Roskilde, Nova Rock, Rock Werchter, NorthSide and Nos Alive have added slates of artists to their 2023 lineups.

Rosalía, Calvin Harris, Kendrick Lamar, Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode, Blur and Halsey top the bill for Primavera Sound 2023, which will be held in two different Spanish cities across two weekends.

Next year’s festival will take place at its usual location of Parc Del Fòrum, Barcelona, on the first weekend (1–3 June).

On the second weekend (8–10 June), the festival will take place in the Ciudad de Rock (City of Rock) in Arganda del Rey, Madrid, for the first time ever.

The Spanish institution recently debuted in São Paulo, Brazil (5-6 November), Buenos Aires, Argentina and Santiago, Chile (both 12-13 November) to commemorate the event’s 20th birthday. Director Alfonso Lanza spoke to IQ about the “incredible response” to the festival’s South American debut.

Elsewhere, Denmark’s Roskilde has secured a raft of household names including Blur, Burna Boy, Christine & The Queens and Queens of the Stone Age for its 2023 edition, scheduled for 24 June to 1 July 2023.

Denmark’s Roskilde has secured Blur, Burna Boy, Christine & The Queens and Queens of the Stone Age

The 51st edition will also feature Alice Glass, Japanese Breakfast, Tove Lo, Denzel Curry and Rina Sawayama. Explore the 50-year history of Roskilde with IQ‘s recent feature.

Austria’s 2023 festival season is beginning to shape with marquee festival Nova Rock confirming headliners Slipknot, Bilderbuch, Die Ärtze, The Prodigy and Tenacious D.

Promoted by Nova Music Entertainment (part of CTS Eventim’s Barracuda Music), the four-day festival is slated for 7–10 June 2023 in Nickelsdorf.

Belgium’s Rock Werchter, meanwhile, has bagged some of the biggest names in rock for the 2023 edition in Festivalpark between 29 June to 2 July.

Muse, Queens of the Stone Age, Arctic Monkeys will top the bill, with support from Fred Again, Oscar and the Wolf, Stromae and more.

Last year’s edition, promoted by Live Nation Belgium and Herman Schueremans, shifted 67,000 combi-tickets and four lots of 21,000 one-day tickets.

“Denmark’s Northside is coming together, with The 1975, White Lies and Muse lined up for the 2023 instalment”

Sister festival Rock Werchter Boutique, meanwhile, will be headlined by P!nk and One Republic on 17 June 2023 in Festivalpark.

Elsewhere, Denmark’s Northside is coming together, with The 1975, White Lies and Muse lined up for the 2023 instalment.

The Down the Drain-promoted event will take place between 1–3 June 2023 in Eskelund park, Aarhus.

Following last week’s confirmation of The Black Keys, Nos Alive has followed up with acts including Angel Olsen, Idles, Tasha Sultana, Lizzo, Men I Trust and Sylvan Esso for next year’s event.

The 15th edition is due to take place between 6–8 July 2023 in the Algés riverside, close to Lisbon.

This year’s NOS Alive, promoted as usual by Everything Is New, welcomed 210,000 people over four days and 165 artists across seven stages.

 


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ITR 2022: Mark Yovich’s global perspective

Unprecedented numbers of events, the ever-shifting technology landscape, new sales patterns, and recovery from Covid – 2022 will certainly go down as one of the landmark years in ticketing.

Throughout the International Ticketing Report we see stories of change across all markets, but let’s zoom out for a moment to consider the worldwide perspective.

In this exclusive interview, Ticketmaster president Mark Yovich takes stock…

 


ITR: Looking back at summer 2022, what’s your assessment of how business has been?
MY
: Summer 2022 will go down as one the biggest in Ticketmaster history. September alone was a record-breaker, with teams in fields, stadiums, and arenas across the Northern hemisphere scanning more than 34m tickets – the largest scan volume we’ve ever seen in the span of just one month. We always knew it was going to be big, but this summer really has blown previous years out of the water. Looking at our own house, we truly have the best people in the business – they rose to the challenge to deliver one of the most electric summers of live.

What lessons do you think Covid has taught the ticketing industry, and what does the ‘new normal’ look like to you from a global perspective?
If the pandemic taught us anything, it’s that the demand for live events endures. The demand from fans clamouring to get back into theatres, clubs, fields, and stadiums has been palpable. It’s a testament to just how important live events are in all of our lives. That act of coming together with friends, family, and other fans to experience the power of live music together is incomparable.

As for the ‘new normal’ – digital is king. We knew this long before 2020, but the pandemic certainly hastened adoption of digital ticketing. Globally, our clients are using double the amount of mobile tickets this year than they were in 2019. Ticketmaster has long been a pioneer in this space, and we continue to invest in innovation to lead the industry.

As we move ahead, it’s obvious that business is now more global than ever. Which is why we evolved ourselves into a single global team, one that is even better equipped to solve the needs of our clients and delight fans wherever they are in the world.

“If the pandemic taught us anything, it’s that the demand for live events endures”

What key themes do you think the industry will be facing in the coming 12-18 months?
Sitting back and waiting for the fan to come to us is a thing of the past. It’s all about convenience and adapting to consumer behaviour patterns. That’s why we’re bullish with our partnerships that help our clients reach potential ticket buyers in whole new ways – on the channels they use the most. This year, we partnered up with Snapchat where we have seen more than 7m event swipes already, and TikTok where we have 55m unique users already engaging with Ticketmaster content. Partnerships like these are invaluable. They further establish Ticketmaster as the place for clients to showcase their inventory and will only continue to lead to increased conversions.

What technologies do you think will be playing an important role in the near future for ticketing?
Fans are at the heart of live events. We are hyper-focused on using fan insights to evolve our marketplace experience for ticket buyers, to even better support our clients’ goals. Our teams have been hard at work evolving our marketplace experience so that it is deeply rooted in responding to fan needs.

As we look at other innovations, NFTs continue to be an exciting area of exploration. We are working in partnership with clients to extend the life of the live event experience before, after, and during the live event experience through the distribution and gamification of NFTs. I expect to see even more creativity in this space roll into 2023.

 


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Bud Light Super Bowl Music Fest reveals ’23 lineup

Paramore, Dave Matthews Band and Imagine Dragons will headline the fourth Bud Light Super Bowl Music Fest.

The three-day festival, which serves as a precursor to the Super Bowl and its coveted Halftime Show, will take place at Phoenix’s 18,000-cap Footprint Center from 9-11 February 2023.

The event kicks off on Thursday 9 February with Paramore and a special guest to be announced, and is followed by Friday night with Dave Matthews Band plus a DJ set by DJ Pee .Wee (Anderson .Paak). The festival then wraps Saturday night with Imagine Dragons and Kane Brown.

“This music festival continues to be at the heart of the Super Bowl Fan Experience and will continue to offer everyone an unforgettable lifetime of memories,” says Paul Caine, president of On Location and IMG Events. “We couldn’t be more excited for those in Phoenix to experience an amazing lineup of headliners who normally wouldn’t perform together for fans.”

The Bud Light Super Bowl Music Fest has previously featured never-before-paired line-ups with artists including Bruno Mars and Cardi B, Post Malone and Aerosmith, Maroon 5 and Dan + Shay with a surprise performance from Demi Lovato, and a night with Guns N’ Roses and special guest Snoop Dogg. Last year’s festival was topped by Halsey, Miley Cyrus and Green Day.

“Beyond the Super Bowl itself, our three-day festival has become the marquee event of Super Bowl week”

“Music and football are core to Bud Light’s DNA, and we’re thrilled to bring our annual Bud Light Super Bowl Music Fest to Phoenix,” says Lane Joyce, director of experiential marketing for Bud Light. “Beyond the Super Bowl itself, our three-day festival has become the marquee event of Super Bowl week. This year, we have an all-star line-up of musicians from various genres, ensuring we have something for all fans whether they’re traveling early for the game or live right here In Arizona.”

The 2019, 2020 and 2022 festivals were held at State Farm Arena in Atlanta, Georgia, the American Airlines Arena in Miami, Florida and the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, respectively.

“Super Bowl Music Fest is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and Footprint Center is honoured to be this year’s host,” adds Ralph Marchetta, general manager of Footprint Center. “We look forward to welcoming fans for three nights of incredible music and showcasing downtown Phoenix as an entertainment destination.”

Rihanna will headline the 2023 Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show on Sunday February 12 at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona.

 


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NEC Group’s Guy Dunstan’s 2023 arenas forecast

NEC Group’s ticketing and arenas MD Guy Dunstan has reflected on the past 12 months for the business and offered his forecast for the year ahead in a new interview with IQ.

Birmingham-based NEC Group manages five of the UK’s leading business, leisure, and entertainment venues including the 15,700-cap Resorts World Arena and 16,118-cap Utilita Arena Birmingham, as well as national ticketing agency The Ticket Factory.

The arenas have welcomed acts including Kasabian, Kendrick Lamar, Biffy Clyro, N-Dubz, Kaiser Chiefs, Nightwish and Evanescence this month alone, with the likes of Iron Maiden, Olly Murs, Blink 182, Michael Bublé, Lewis Capaldi, Lizzo and Paramore lined up for 2023.

Overall, however, Dunstan describes the arena sector’s first full year since returning from the pandemic as “decent” rather than “stellar”, and expects 2023 to provide a similar story.

“We all thought 18 months ago that when we got the green light, we were going to have record breaking years”

“When we get to November, you have a good feel for how things are going to look next year and – in terms of what we’ve got confirmed, on sale and pencilled – I’m hoping we’re going to be where we’ve been this year,” he says. “We’ve hit the level of business that we expected. It’s not been a stellar year, but it’s been a decent year in terms of getting back to business. We’ve been hit hard in terms of increased costs right across the board, which obviously then snowballs into costs for consumers and playing venues in the arena market.

“We all thought 18 months ago that when we got the green light, we were going to have record breaking years. It hasn’t been as positive as that but it’s been good enough from a level of shows point of view and I think that will continue next year. I think it’s going to be good, but not spectacular.

Nevertheless, the venues have seen “unprecedented” demand for tickets for British comedian Peter Kay’s first stand-up arena tour in over a decade. The tour, which currently includes 16 Birmingham dates, begins next month and is scheduled to run until July 2025.

“It’s the highest demand we’ve ever seen for an onsale on our website, it was just through the roof,” says Dunstan. “We knew from previous experience with him that it would be really strong, but this was off the chart, absolutely amazing.”

Dunstan is further buoyed by the strong sales performances of recent and upcoming first-time arena headliners such as Billie Eilish, Lewis Capaldi, Machine Gun Kelly, Dave, Yungblud and Tom Grennan, as well as non-music productions like The Masked Singer Live, Disney on Ice, Ru Paul’s Drag Race and Cirque du Soleil.

“People are still wanting to go to shows, which is encouraging”

“People are still wanting to go to shows, which is encouraging,” he adds. “The last month was a real litmus test based on the doom and gloom that we’d been hearing throughout the media. We get it that people’s incomes and costs have been squeezed on utilities and the last couple of months are where people were seeing their energy costs jump up significantly. But we’ve seen in previous recessions that people still want to come out and be entertained and hopefully that will continue.”

The former National Arenas Association chair also weighs in on the current volatility of the pound to dollar exchange rate and its impact on US acts coming to the UK.

“We might see a reduction in international acts over the next couple of years,” he surmises. “We’ve had some decent onsales with those acts from across the Atlantic, so I’m hoping that drives confidence but if we do see a slowdown, hopefully that gap can be filled by domestic acts and we still see the same levels of business.

“It is something we’re keeping an eye on, but right now the level of business is in line with what we were forecasting when we came back to business 12 months ago, so hopefully we’ll get to where we need to be.”

 


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Italian Supreme Court backs TicketOne appeal

The Italian Supreme Administrative Court (CdS) has ruled in favour of TicketOne in its appeal against a €10.9 million fine for alleged abuses of its dominant market position.

The original 2021 ruling by the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) had previously been dismissed and the fine annulled by a Lazio court in March this year.

It followed an investigation into the market leader’s parent company CTS Eventim and related to complaints by venue operator Zed Entertainment, which accused TicketOne of “an abusive strategy of an exclusionary nature” involving complex deals, contracts and acquisitions.

The dispute first became public in 2019 when a handful of Italian promoters, led by Zed’s Valeria Arzenton, alleged unfair competition on the part of Eventim-owned Friends and Partners (F&P).

“The CdS found that the ICA had in fact failed to examine sufficiently the applicants’ defence of the existence of a lawful purpose pursued by the acquisitions”

Arzenton accused CTS Eventim/F&P of trying to strong-arm promoters and artists into ticketing contracts with TicketOne at the expense of non-Eventim operators – a claim strenuously denied by CTS Eventim, TicketOne, F&P and sister companies D’Alessandro e Galli, Vertigo and Vivo Concerti.

According to the CdS, reports Lexology, the contested practices – in particular the acquisitions and related exclusivity clauses — “may plausibly be objectively justified” and do not necessarily result in an unlawful restriction.

“The CdS found that the ICA had in fact failed to examine sufficiently the applicants’ defence of the existence of a lawful purpose pursued by the acquisitions,” it adds.

However, last month’s judgement suggests the matter is not yet closed.

“The CdS confirmed that the retaliatory conduct and boycotts implemented against other operators such as Zed, may in fact constitute abuses of dominance requiring further investigations by the ICA and possible revision of the fine initially imposed on CTS Eventim – Ticketone,” it adds.

 


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International Ticketing Report 2022 out now

The latest edition of the International Ticketing Report (formerly the International Ticketing Yearbook) is out now, accessible in print, via a dedicated mini site and as a digital magazine.

Since it was first published in 2015, the ITR has been the only global guide to the live entertainment ticketing market.

The seventh instalment features in-depth profiles of the top 40+ live entertainment markets around the world, as well as insights and information from the most important companies in each market.

The Report also offers features on ticketing tech, NFTs (non-fungible tokens) and an in-depth interview with Ticketmaster president Mark Yovich.

“2022 has seen one of the busiest periods for ticketing companies ever”

“With most countries joyously greeting audiences in venues once more, 2022 has seen one of the busiest periods for ticketing companies ever,” says the Report’s editor James Drury.

“And despite the challenges this pressure brings, the sector has been responding with ingenuity. Every year there are new tech and hot topics to discuss, and as always we’re taking an in-depth look at them. In this edition, you’ll discover some of the companies that are finding creative solutions to some of the industry’s problems, while we take a special look at NFTs and what their growing popularity means for promoters and ticketers alike.”

This year’s ITR is available in print, digitally, and on the dedicated year-round mini-site. IQ subscribers can read the digital magazine here, or access the mini site here. To purchase a print copy of the report, please email [email protected].

Stockholm Live to operate reopened Kägelbanan

ASM Global has announced that Stockholm’s Kägelbanan will be reopening under new operator Stockholm Live after a three-year closure.

The venue at Södra Teatern has previously hosted artists such as Coldplay, The Killers, Ice Cube, The Libertines and First Aid Kid. it will will undergo renovations before reopening, including a new light and sound system.

It joins Stockholm Live’s portfolio of venues in the Swedish capital, which includes new outdoor venue Betongparken as well as ASM Global’s UK and European portfolio, which includes Manchester’s AO Arena, First Direct Arena in Leeds, Olympia London and P&J Aberdeen, among others.

“It will be an important piece in Stockholm’s cultural scene going forward”

“Kägelbanan is an incredibly important venue for Stockholm with all its history and great artists who have performed here,” says Stockholm Live CEO Andreas Sand. “With its capacity of close to 1,000 spectators, it fits perfectly into what is requested by our promoters, and with its location and atmosphere, it will be an important piece in Stockholm’s cultural scene going forward.”

Stockholm Live will use Kägelbanan for concerts and events, but nightclub activities will not be conducted in the premises as in previous times.

ASM took over operations at Södra Teatern, which is one of the city’s oldest active theatres, in July 2021.

 


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