Nic Fildes from the Dow Jones recently wrote an interesting article on the shifting advertising practices of European mobile phone companies.

Mobile companies have historically spent the largest amount of their marketing budgets on sponsoring sporting events and sports teams. However, this may be changing as these companies are drastically increasing the advertising budgets for live music performances, which have seen a boom in concert attendance.

In addition, mobile content is becoming an increasingly important area for mobile companies to focus on with customers, and sales of music and ring tones are a high-margin business for these technology companies.

Some key stats from the article include:

• More than 1.7 million concerts have been held in England and Wales over the past year
• The U.K. live music industry is estimated to be worth GBP 487 million per year, up 50% since 1997, despite a decline in the sales of recorded music sold via old medium
• T-Mobile signed an exclusive deal with singer Robbie Williams in July where its customs could download the singer’s content onto their phones
• O2 is moving its GBP3 million per year sponsorship of the Arsenal soccer team, and perhaps other athletic sponsorships, to music sponsorships, with almost GBP2 million to be spent on music sponsorship this year alone
• Other mobile provider sponsorships of live music include: Virgin Mobil sponsoring the V Festival, France Telecom SA’s Orange’s sponsorship of the Glastonbury Festival and T-In-The-Park Festival, and various music sponsorships by Ericsson.