The story
CTS Computer Ticket Service GmbH was founded by Munich-based concert promoters Marcel Avram and Matthias Hoffmann on 4 November 1989. It was acquired in 1996 by Klaus-Peter Schulenberg. Schulenberg took the company partially public on 1 February 2000 on the Frankfurt stock exchange. That same year, the company entered into the live entertainment market with the partial acquisitions of several German concert promoters, such as Marek Lieberberg Konzertagentur, Peter Rieger Konzertagentur, Semmel Concerts, Argo Konzerte, FKP Scorpio, and Dirk Becker Entertainment. Over the years, CTS Eventim would acquire several other ticketing and live entertainment companies, including Austrian promoter Barracuda Music (71% in 2017), Italian promoters Vertigo (51% in 2017) and Friends & Partners (60% in 2017), Holiday on Ice (50% in 2014 followed by a complete acquisition in 2016), Ticket Online (100% in 2010) and Stage Entertainment's remaining ticketing companies in France, Spain and the Netherlands (100% in 2014) and the Italian DI and GI Srl (60% in 2018), company that organizes Lucca Summer Festival, one of the most important Italian music festivals.
Together with other sponsors, CTS Eventim ensured the long-term continuation of the Kontaktstudiengang Popularmusik at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg since 2008, now known as Eventim Popkurs.
In the late 2000's the company started operating several venues, starting with the Waldbühne in Berlin.
The company diversified its ticketing operations in 2015 when it acquired 51% of the German-based Kinoheld, a company that specialises in ticket sales for cinemas. The ownership was raised in 2018 to 100%.
In November 2019, CTS Eventim's revenue exceeded €1 billion for the first time in a nine-month period, and the share price had risen 60% that year to reach a market capitalisation of €5.2 billion.
Eventim France and France Billet merged their French activities in 2019, in the new company Eventim will hold a 48% of the shares with a possibility of raising the ownership in the coming years. The company also merged its Swiss subsidiaries in 2020 with Gadget Entertainment AG and Wepromote Entertainment Group Switzerland AG, taking a 60% share in the new company named Gadget abc Entertainment Group AG.
In February 2020, it was announced that the company would enter the US market via a joint venture with Michael Cohl.
In July 2021, CTS Eventim launched Eventim Live Asia. In August 2021, the company announced plans to construct one of Italy's largest multipurpose arenas, PalaItalia.
From Wikipedia’s article on CTS Eventim, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5