BuyDRM Acquired by Inisoft, Takes on Growing Mobile Device Market
In a move that should strengthen both company's positions in the mobile device market, Inisoft has announced that it will acquire BuyDRM.
"They made us a great offer, one which we decided not to pass on," says BuyDRM's CEO Christopher Levy. While he wasn't looking for an acquisition, Levy notes that Inisoft's strengths in mobile software development will help BuyDRM advance its offerings and go after the market.
Today's premium content providers care more about protecting their assets on Apple iOS and Google Android devices than they do on Windows and Macintosh PCs, says Levy. His team hasn't been able to advance their DRM mobile technology as fast as they'd like, but being a part of Inisoft should change that. The industry is changing dramatically, he adds, and DRM needs to support iOS and Android natively.
As a result of the acquisition, BuyDRM will no longer be a software-as-a-service offering delivering encryption and licensing, but will expand into a software platform that can offer software agents that enable the delivery of encrypted content.
"This gives us more tools in our toolkit to service that business," says Levy. "The message is now that the platform is not just a DRM platform, we're also a software platform."
The two companies will continue to be run separately, with Levy as the CEO of Austin, Texas-based BuyDRM. Inisoft is based in Seoul, South Korea. Levy and his team had to sign two-year contracts, agreeing to stay on after the acquisition.
Digital rights management is a healthy industry, Levy notes, adding that demand is higher now than ever before. Driving much of that success are things like the Microsoft Xbox and the Apple iOS operating system. Entertainment options such as Netflix and HBO Go wouldn't be possible without DRM, he says.
"We're looking at one of the best years in our company's history in terms of revenue," says Levy.
Acquisition talks began only a few months ago, heating up around the time of the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) conference. Levy can't comment on the terms of the deal, but he denies that there's a yacht in his future.
"I'm more of a race car guy," says Levy.
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