SUP signs exclusive partnership with Last.fm

SUP announced today that it had signed an exclusive partnership with Last.fm, the world's largest social music site, to develop joint advertising sales campaigns in the Russian market.

This new deal will also see LiveJournal, Russia's largest social network and managed by SUP, launch a series of marketing initiatives to build the Last.fm audience in Russia. These new features will include online functionality as well as user events and promotions, these initiatives will be launched over the course of the next three months.

In addition to these plans the deal will also see +SOL, SUP's online sales house, becoming the exclusive sales representative for Last.fm in Russia. The advertising partnership launched today with Nokia becoming the first local advertiser to partner with Last.fm in Russia.

This deal will provide a platform for Last.fm to grow even further in Russia, offer LiveJournal users an even better experience and provide additional revenues for both businesses.

Last fm has over 600,000 unique monthly users in the former USSR. While LiveJournal has over 7,500,000 unique monthly users in the former USSR.

This partnership marks the start of a long-term relationship with Last.fm and SUP. The relationship will focus on both building audience and revenues for both businesses.

Andrew Paulson, the CEO of SUP commented on the deal as he addressed the Web 2.0 summit in California, he said: "Last.fm is one of the great online brands. I am thrilled that we'll be working with them to grow their audience in Russia even further, to offer new music functionality to LiveJournal users in Russia and of course, to sell more advertising to premium brands. This is a partnership which we take great pride in."

Martin Stiksel, co-founder of Last.fm, said: "We're very excited to be partnering Sup in Russia. Within Europe, Russia is one of Last.fm's biggest userbases, so of course it makes absolute sense for us to work with the business that runs LiveJournal, the country's favourite blog. Working with SUP's advertising team will help us as we take our marketing to the next level"

About SUP

SUP was founded in 2006 and in less than year has become a leading Russian online media company. SUP has consistently led the way in online and social media both in Russia and other former Soviet republics. The company is building a portfolio of services and projects which reflecting a modern approach to the web. SUP owns the licence to develop LiveJournal, Russia's largest social network. This agreement covers any Cyrillic content on LiveJournal and all users in the former USSR. SUP also holds a leading position in sports media as the owner of Championat.ru, one of Russia's largest sport websites. The media advertising agency +SOL and the full service client advertising agency Victory S. A. also come under SUP's umbrella. Sup is an open-minded and dynamic company with simple aim: to be an international media company based in Russia and working across the globe. It has an enthusiastic and experienced team who know what works, and what doesn't.

About Last.fm

Founded in 2002 in London, Last.fm is the online, social music revolution that connects people with music and artists with listeners. By joining the Last.fm community, music fans can choose to share their music preferences by linking their media player to the Last.fm database. This database is populated continually with over 500 million monthly track submissions from Last.fm music fans. As a result, Last.fm can intelligently recommend songs, artists, local concerts and even other members based on their musical tastes. Thanks to partnerships with EMI, Warner Music Group, SONY BMG, independent aggregators The Orchard and IODA, and more than 100,000 independent musicians and 20,000 labels that upload music directly to the site, Last.FM can draw recommendations from one of the most extensive online music catalogues. Learn more about Last.fm at www.last.fm. IT

Contact

Christian Ward, PR Manager, Last.fm E: christian@last.fm T: +44 (0)20 7780 7080 M: +44 (0)7764 2354 011

Maria Spasibo, Communications Manager, SUP E: Maria.spasibo@bulyon.com M: +7 916 394 7792