A new Scottish-based company launched at Midem International Music Market in Cannes on January 26th 2004 will address one of the music industry's most pressing and complex issues – how to licence and administer music rights for new distribution channels, such as internet download, streaming and mobile phones.

Rightsrouter, a rights administration business, has already assisted countless artists including Stereophonics, Craig David, Liberty X, Elbow, Underworld and Nitin Sawney onto new services such as  O2 Music, MSN/HMV/Tiscali (via OD2), the Japanese broadband service So-net, as well as fully legitimate trials with the file-sharing network KaZaA. and a 400 label licensing deal with Napster. The team also worked on a trial involving Chinese broadband services that resulted in the world's first ever royalties from that country to be paid to UK labels.

The company has been spun out of the Association of Independent Music's (AIM) new media division and has been funded through a private equity investment by Incubix, a Swiss-based investment and advisory firm with a focus on the media industry, and with support from Scottish Development International. Rightsrouter is currently working with record labels from across Europe, South America and even China.

Rightsrouter's CEO Gavin Robertson believes that: “The current rights infrastructure creates a bottleneck that Rightsrouter will resolve and so create many opportunities for new businesses and for the right owners themselves”.

Scotland's Minister for Enterprise, Jim Wallace, welcomed the news about Glasgow-based Rightsrouter.

He said: “I am delighted to welcome the announcement by Rightsrouter to locate its headquarters in Glasgow. This strengthens the already thriving music industry in Glasgow with an innovative concept for the trading of licences.

“I am particularly pleased that a Regional Selective Assistance offer of £250k from the Executive played a role in securing this project. I wish all at Rightsrouter Limited every success for the future”.

Ron Culley, chief executive of Scottish Enterprise Glasgow, commented: "The decision to base Rightsrouter in Glasgow underlines the city's role as a cultural and economic home for the creative industries at the heart of Scotland's knowledge economy”.