DTI Management, a developer of inventory-management software for ticket resellers, has accused Vivid Seats of attempting to lure brokers away from its platform in revenge for refusing to give the site a pricing discount.

DTI, whose clients include AEG and several sports teams, says Vivid Seats demanded DTI and its resellers provide a 7% discount on their fees in order to retain access to the site. “They are trying to force us and [our] brokers to cave in, or lose access to their platform,” CEO Curtis Cheng tells Ticket News.

Cheng (pictured) says DTI “does pretty decent business with Vivid, around 18% of their sales”, which he says amounts to more than US$9 million a month, but isn’t willing to back down: “Even though they may be the third or fourth largest exchange, there are 1,800 sites doing the same thing.

“They are trying to force us and our brokers to cave in or lose access to their platform”

“We will protect and defend ourselves from Vivid’s bullying tactic. But who is going to protect those smaller brokers?”

A spokeswoman for Vivid Seats did not respond to a request for comment.

CVC Capital Partners, the London-based private-equity firm which in September agreed to sell its controlling interest in Formula 1 to Liberty Media Group, recently invested $75m in DTI, which it hopes to turn into “the global leader in live entertainment ticket distribution”.

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CVC Capital Partners, the London-based private-equity firm which last month agreed to sell its controlling interest in Formula 1 to Liberty Media Group, has bought into DTI Management, an inventory management and distribution platform for ticket resellers.

Virginia-based DTI, one of the Washington Business Journal’s fifty fastest-growing companies of 2016, distributes its customers’ tickets to “99% of the secondary ticket resale websites on the internet”, including StubHub, Vivid Seats, SeatGeek and Ticketmaster’s resale sites, using proprietary software.

CVC says its goal for the cash – a joint investment with New Amsterdam Growth Capital totalling US$75 million – is to make DTI “the global leader in sports and live entertainment ticket distribution”.

“This investment will allow DTI to continue scaling our platform, which has emerged as the leading choice for ticket brokers, and to secure access to large-scale ticketing deals on their behalf”

DTI’s CEO, Curtis Cheng – the founder of resale site Ticket Monster and a former shareholder in Ticket Technology, which was acquired by StubHub in 2008 – says: “This investment will allow DTI to continue scaling our platform, which has emerged as the leading choice for ticket brokers, and to secure access to large-scale ticketing deals on their behalf.”

CVC managing partner John Clark adds: “DTI is a clear industry leader, bringing transparency and accountability to the secondary ticket selling environment while also providing value to key constituents in the ticket value chain. The secondary ticketing market has seen strong growth in recent years, and we are excited to partner with Curtis and his management team.”

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