Music entrepreneur Ben Drury is one of the brains behind 7digital, a company specialising in music downloads. PRASANNA RAMAN traces his route to winning an award for leading entrepreneurs under 35. THERE’S more to music today than there has ever been and Ben Drury would know this best.
As the founder and chief executive officer of UK’s highly successful 7digital, a company specialising in, chiefly legal music downloads, Drury has not only seen the changes in the industry but also played a major role in shaping the landscape in his country’s music industry.
Touted as a rival to Apple’s iTunes online music store, 7digital not only offers music downloads but also video, audiobooks, games, documents, streaming video on demand and pretty much anything else that can be delivered digitally. It presently has over 1.2 million registered customers.
One would think that this entertainment-minded Englishman (or lad, back in mid 1990s) would have had some form of formal education in the music field but you would be surprised to know that he holds a degree in Physics with Philosophy of Science from King’s College London.
“I studied Physics and Philosophy at King’s College London mainly because I wanted to be in the City for the music scene. I was playing guitar in a band and you had to be in the city to play gigs! I quickly realised that I was not the academic type and although I loved certain aspects of studying Physics, I think music and technology were bigger passions,” he said in a recent e-mail interview.
That is how he jumped at the chance to join a publishing company involved with music. His new vocation at United News and Media saw the birth of dotmusic.com in 1996, as a sister online publication to Music Week magazine. Dotmusic grew quickly to become a leading online music destination attracting over 1.8 million users per month by 1999.
In 2000, when he was just 24, Drury was headhunted by BT Group to head up the broadband music efforts at its Internet Service Provider, BT Openworld (that would be like our Streamyx or Jaring which offers Internet connection). As head of music at BT, Drury successfully launched a major music channel before leading the acquisition of his old company dotmusic in 2002. At BT, Drury pioneered music and video downloads on dotmusic with the UK’s first unlimited subscription offer.
Following the partnership between BT and Yahoo! to form BT Yahoo! in 2003, the young man engineered the sale of dotmusic to Yahoo! for approximately STG3.3 million (RM21.45 million). The entrepreneur within starting emerging and soon after Drury decided to start a business of his own in 2004.
Pairing up with co-founder James Kane, they started a business involving digital media and specifically legal downloads.
“We established 7digital because we wanted to have a constant revenue stream– from sales of downloads – which was something dotmusic never really achieved. Furthermore, dotmusic wasn’t an e-commerce site as it was more an online magazine,” he said, explaining how digital7 came into being.
When asked why the name 7digital, Drury responded, “We’re not really sure – we have come up with reasons after the event but no one really remembers why. Is the number seven lucky in Malaysia?” he queries with hope.
Just two years later, Drury was named by Growing Business magazine as a Young Gun 2006 – the award for leading entrepreneurs under 35.
And last year, 7digital was awarded the prestigious Red Herring award Top 100 Europe Award as one of the most promising technology companies in Europe.
Drury is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and deputy chairman and director of the Entertainment Retailers Association as well as a board director of the Official UK Charts Company.
As for the company’s future plans, Drury said it has just closed a large investment round of US$8.5 million (RM29.75 million). “We’re really looking to expand internationally and onto platforms such as mobile and other connected devices as well as to move beyond music into movies, TV and even games,” he said.
Touching on the direction of music and music entrepreneurs Drury said people in the music industry today have to do more themselves.
“Whether it’s management, recording, marketing or the sort. With the Internet, the tools are readily available. The only difference is that you have to use them creatively and innovatively,” he advised music entrepreneurs.
And if one wonders how studying Physics has helped him in this line, this is what Drury had to say: “Studying Physics teaches you to think in different and abstract ways and that is very helpful in technology and business!”
Although digital music is in his blood, Drury is also passionate about the future of nuclear fusion as a clean energy source in the years to come.
Malaysians, especially music and digital entrepreneurs, will get an opportunity to learn all about Drury’s experiences when he speaks at the British Council’s Creative Entrepreneurs programme on March 10 at PNB Darby Park, Jalan Binjai, Kuala Lumpur from 9am to 12.30pm. The talk is also in line with British Council’s call for nominations for the International Young Music Entrepreneur Award 2008.
Those interested to know more about Drury and the recipe for his success can register for his talk via e-mail to arts@britishcouncil.org.my or call 03-2723-7988.
Alternatively, for more information, visit www.britishcouncil.org.my.
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