DTI pulls inventory from Vivid Seats
DTI Management has pulled its entire ticket inventory from Vivid Seats following last week’s public spat between the two companies.
In a letter to its customers, DTI – an inventory management/distribution platform for ticket resellers – apologised for the “sudden removal of your inventory”, but revealed it has negotiated lower fees for tickets listed on two other resale sites, which CEO Curtis Cheng says should “not only make up for any lost sales momentum [from cutting ties with Vivid Seats], but allow it to increase”.
Fees for DTI clients selling on StubHub are now 2% – well below the site’s standard 10% rate – and 4% on TicketNetwork.
“Rest assured this inconvenience was not in vain”
“Rest assured that this inconvenience was not in vain,” wrote Cheng (pictured) in the letter, seen by Amplify, “as it has allowed for DTI to work with our portfolio of marketplaces to make many positive and rapidly evolving changes that we believe will not only make up for any lost sales momentum but allow it to increase.”
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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DTI Management attacks “bullying” Vivid Seats
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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Swift plays only 2016 show as lawsuit rumbles on
Taylor Swift, whose 1989 world tour was the highest-grossing of 2015, played her only full concert of 2016 yesterday at the United States grand prix in Austin, Texas.
Swift played a 15-song set for an audience of roughly 80,000 at the Circuit of the Americas following the conclusion of the Formula 1 race, which was won by Britain’s Lewis Hamilton for the Mercedes team.
A surprise addition to the the setlist was Calvin Harris’s ‘This is What You Came For’, written by Swift with ex Harris:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QI2veX1h68k
Swift has for much of 2016 been embroiled in a lawsuit with radio DJ David Mueller, whom she alleges groped her buttocks at a fan meeting at the Pepsi Center in Denver in June 2013. “I remember being frantic, distressed, feeling violated in a way I had never experienced before,” Swift said a video deposition leaked to Billboard. “A meet-and-greet is supposed to be a situation where you’re thanking people for coming, you’re supposed to be welcoming people into your home, which is the arena for that day. For someone to violate that hospitality in that way, I was completely stunned.”
Liberty Media, which owns 34% of Live Nation, agreed in September to acquire Formula 1 from its current owner, CVC Capital Partners. CVC has since invested US$75 million into DTI Management, an inventory-management platform for secondary ticket sellers.
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CVC pumps $75m into resale ticket distributor DTI
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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