Well, we asked what the management buyout of Virgin Megastore UK last week meant for the retail chain's sister company Virgin Digital, and now we know. It means the end. Yes, Virgin Digital announced it was closing down on Friday.
As much previously reported, Virgin Digital was the Virgin Group's attempt to win a slice of the digital music market, aiming to capitalise on the company's high profile brand and high street presence in a bid to take on iTunes. But the service, which primarily pushed a subscription based package, failed to catch on, the subscription model generally yet to prove popular with music fans, and the whole system being bogged down by its Microsoft powered DRM system, which meant the service was not compatible with the market leader iPod.
The service only ever launched in the US and UK, and the American version was shuttered at the start of the year with subscribers there being encouraged to take up a Napster subscription instead.
The UK service continued in the short term, but after the news last week that sister company Virgin Megastore was being bought out by Zavvi Entertainment, a message was posted on the Virgin Digital home page last week reading: "We regret to announce that the Virgin Digital service is due to close. We will be taking no new customers from today, Friday 21st September. On Friday the 28th September we will cease selling tracks and access will be for current Club users only. On Friday the 19th October the site will close for all customers". Former Virgin Digital subscribers will be offered a free months usage of the music streaming service provided by another Virgin company, Virgin Media.
Other than the letter on the Virgin Digital website there has been no comment from Virgin or Zavvi regarding the closure. Virgin said last week on the sale of the Megastore UK chain that it did not see entertainment retail as part of its operations moving forward. Whether Zavvi have any ambitions to enter the download space with a new digital offering remains to be seen.