Pinnacle Entertainment was an entertainment group based in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

spanning many divisions, but primarily known as one of the UK's leading

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented ...

distributors A distributor is an enclosed rotating switch used in spark-ignition internal combustion engines that have mechanically timed ignition. The distributor's main function is to route high voltage current from the ignition coil to the spark plugs ...

History

In 1996, Windsong/Pinnacle was purchased by the

Zomba Group Zomba may refer to: Places Hungary * Zomba, Hungary, village Malawi *Zomba, Malawi, city * Zomba District * Zomba Massif, mountain *Roman Catholic Diocese of Zomba * Zomba (meteorite), see Meteorite fall Other * 1468 Zomba, an asteroid *Zomb ...

. When Zomba was subsequently purchased by BMG in 2002, Windsong/Pinnacle was moved under Bertelsmann's group

Arvato AG Arvato is a global services company headquartered in Gütersloh, Germany. Its services include customer support, information technology, logistics, and finance. The history of Arvato goes back to the printing and industry services division of Be ...

. In January 2008, Windsong completed a

buyout In finance, a buyout is an investment transaction by which the ownership equity of a company, or a majority share of the stock of the company is acquired. The acquiror thereby "buys out" the present equity holders of the target company. A buyout ...

from Arvato, gaining independent ownership again. However, in the midst of an

economic crisis An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with the p ...

, the company was forced to go into

administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal ** Administrative assistant, Administrative Assistant, traditionally known as a Secretary, or also known as an admini ...

, effective December 3, 2008. It was then that Windsong Exports purchased the group and turned it into the UK's leading music distributor. Following that, the companies were usually referred to jointly as Windsong/Pinnacle.

Divisions

Audio Services

Pinnacle's music division Audio Services Ltd., was primarily known for the distribution of over 400 independent record labels in the UK, but it also consisted of its own record label, label management for distributed labels, and marketing and sales divisions.About Us
Pinnacle Entertainment, 2001.

Record labels

Pinnacle Records Pinnacle Entertainment was an entertainment group based in the United Kingdom spanning many divisions, but primarily known as one of the UK's leading independent record label Record distributor, distributors. History In 1996, Windsong/Pinnacle w ...

(artists include Flintlock, James Arthur Edwards) *Firebird Records (Artists included

Nick Straker Nick Straker (born Nicholas Bailey) is a London-born musician, who had hits in Europe and the US in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Career Straker joined his first band, called Stonehenge, in 1969. The band changed its name in 1971 to Matumbi, ...

) * Collins Classics - Formed in 1989, closed in 1998.

Pinnacle Software

Formed in 1992, Pinnacle Software serves as a publishing company that represents many

computer software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

companies such as 3MV, New Note, Shellshock and Beechwood. It provides retail, sales, marketing and logistics services to its publishing partners. Deals with

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...

and

Ubisoft Ubisoft Entertainment SA (; ; formerly Ubi Soft Entertainment SA) is a French video game publisher headquartered in Saint-Mandé with development studios across the world. Its video game franchises include '' Assassin's Creed'', ''Far Cry'', '' ...

helped introduce an exclusive distribution model to the UK Software market. Some brands associated with Pinnacle Software include

FIFA FIFA (; stands for ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' ( French), meaning International Association Football Federation ) is the international governing body of association football, beach football and futsal. It was found ...

Harry Potter ''Harry Potter'' is a series of seven fantasy literature, fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the lives of a young Magician (fantasy), wizard, Harry Potter (character), Harry Potter, and his friends ...

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...

Splinter Cell ''Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell'' is a series of stealth action-adventure video games, the first of which was released in 2002, and their tie-in novels that were endorsed by Tom Clancy. The series follows Sam Fisher, a highly trained agent of a ...

and

Prince of Persia ''Prince of Persia'' is a video game franchise created by Jordan Mechner. It is built around a series of action-adventure games focused on various incarnations of the eponymous Prince, set in ancient and medieval Persia. The first two games i ...

Gauntlet Entertainment

Formed in 1996, Gauntlet Entertainment was a distributor of video games. Formed by Peter Rezon to create a focused distribution model for video games, similar to what Pinnacle Software had been doing with other UK software companies. The distribution model they pioneered became the

de facto ''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with ''de jure'' ("by la ...

model used by most major software publishers in the UK. Gauntlet Entertainment succeeded in doing so with ground breaking deals with Sierra, NovaLogic, THQ International, CDV Software and many other International Publishing houses. It has been associated with many of the top brands in the market place, including WWE Smackdown!, Cossacks, Rugrats, Warcraft, Half Life, Scooby Doo, Tetris and many more.About Us
Gauntlet Entertainment, 2004.

References

External links

Pinnacle EntertainmentPinnacle Vision
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pinnacle Entertainment (Uk) Defunct record labels of the United Kingdom Record labels disestablished in 2008 IFPI members