MUMBAI: The Indian music industry and its allied sectors will come together on a common platform to discuss issues facing the music business at Nokia Music Connects 2009, to be held in Mumbai at the Taj Lands End on Wednesday.

A joint venture conceptualised by Hong Kong based Music Matters and leading Indian media portal Radioandmusic.com, Nokia Music Connects is envisaged as an annual gathering of the Indian music business.

The day long conference will comprise a series of high powered panels formed of key industry executives, who will dwell on and discuss several pertinent issues facing the music industry in India. Speakers at the various panels include regulatory heads, music label honchos, advertising gurus, corporate heads as well as top notch creative professionals from the music industry, both from India and abroad. Those participating in the conference will be key players from all these sectors, making the event as much of an exciting networking platform as a forum where vital issues facing the industry will be discussed and a path to the future will be forged. The venture is supported by the umbrella organisation of the music industry, the Indian Music Industry (IMI) and will be marked by research presentations on the business and consumer aspects of the business, along with the panel discussions. We are also happy to be able to announce Nokia as title sponsor of the event which will be called– Nokia Music Connects – The Indian Music Forum.... The panels that will make up the conference include one on Mobile/Digital issues, one on live music events scene in India, one on the advertising industry's changing equation with music, one on Bollywood, among others. Among the industry luminaries who have agreed to be part of the conference are IMI president Vijay Lazarus, Saregama's Atul Churamani, Sony Music managing director Shridar Subramaniam, Hungama founder Neeraj Roy, among others.

India is one of Asia's powerhouse entertainment markets. We thought it would be great to give India a platform exhibit its music to the world and it creates opportunities for the music business to have a look around India,... said Jasper Donat, co-founder of Branded. I think this will be a mini-Music Matters. It'll essentially be covering the same topics but with India as a focus....

The forum will discuss several pertinent issues the Indian music industry is facing such as the mobile and digital landscape, the live music scene in India, the advertising industry's changing relationship with music and the evolution of Bollywood.