Stand with Smart to Support Khmer Original Music

Phnom Penh, 07th July 2016: Smart announced its stance in supporting local music artists as part of its broad movement to develop Cambodia’s entertainment industry. This latest campaign will be the foundation of raising awareness of the importance of protecting the intellectual property rights of music produced by local artists while increasing the motivation of the Cambodian public to produce more Khmer Music.

Plagiarism and piracy have been prevalent for years in the Cambodian music industry but recently there has been increased consciousness from both consumers and the music artists of the need to protect Khmer-made-songs. Further, coming up with local and original music content has now become a new trend among the young population of Cambodia. This revival presents new opportunities to the country’s music industry. In order to facilitate and promote this new mindset and to protect and support local music talents, Smart who is the leading provider of music content in the country, continues to provide new opportunities and services to entertain the local community and to inspire individuals who have a strong passion and interest in music. Thomas Hundt, CEO of Smart Axiata said, “Our passion in music is relentless and obvious. Hosting international concerts starring Demi Lovato and Jessie J through the exclusive partnership with Universal Music brought world class entertainment to Cambodia and that is the vision we have for Cambodian music: World-Class. Building on that, we want to facilitate opportunities for local talents to produce more excellent Khmer music!”
The “Stand with Us to Support Khmer Original Music” campaign will be carried out from 01st to 31st July at various universities, public places and malls. Anyone can join Smart in this unique initiative by downloading Smart Music, a music streaming mobile application which allows to listen to a catalogue of over 1 million songs, anywhere, anytime while at the same time provides financial support to the artists. When we illegally download music and listen to it without paying, Cambodian local artists will gradually lose their motivation to compose new music and they will instead just plagiarize foreign songs. “Creativity has no boundary. With a lot of talent in the country, we can imagine how great the music that Cambodians can produce could be. Music compositions can only be great when there is enough motivation, hard work, support and platforms for artist to monetize their work. Smart is putting all of these pieces of the puzzle together and we hope you join this movement by downloading the Smart Music app to support Khmer original music”, Thomas continued.
The month of July will certainly be a special month for music lovers. Smart Music is available on both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store for free download. The standard subscription fee of 30 cents per week will be waived by Smart throughout the month of July for new consumers who wish to enjoy listening and being part of this campaign. Smart accepts the 1 million downloads challenge, will you? Join us in to amplify Khmer Original Music!