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Business News Digital
Guvera raises AUS$100 million in new finance, IPO still on the agenda
By Chris Cooke | Published on Thursday 26 November 2015
Australian-based streaming music firm Guvera has just announced a new round of financing to the tune of AUS$100 million, with backers including a “number of wealthy Australian families” and a private-equity group founded by the digital company’s CEO, according to The Australian Financial Review.
Unlike rival Spotify, Guvera has already confirmed that it is planning an initial public offering that will float the company on either the Australian Securities Exchange or US-based Nasdaq at some point in the future. A precise timeline for that is still to be confirmed. The new finance will presumably fuel growth until then, but it won’t necessarily buy the company too much time, given the firm reported a net loss of AUS$81.1 million in its most recent financial year.
Launching in Australia five years ago as an ad-funded download platform, since morphing into a streaming service Guvera has put most efforts into Asian markets where the likes of Spotify are less well established.
It has also talked up its ad-funded side as a business in its own right, rather than just a loss-leading marketing tool to sell subscriptions, reckoning that its rivals have failed to evolve their advertising products to capitalise on opportunities in the free streaming market. Though the firm’s revenues last year might suggest Guvera is struggling to capitalise on those opportunities too.
For a time it looked like Guvera was about to arrive in the UK when it bought the existing Blinkbox streaming service from Tesco in January, but then it suddenly shut the Blinkbox company down in June. The firm now faces legal action from former Blinkbox employees over allegations it failed to meet obligations made to staff as part of its acquisition of the company.
