Los Angeles - Universal Music/Interscope Records on Tuesday said on Tuesday that it will launch an animated series featuring platinum-selling hip-hop artist Soulja Boy. The label tapped Buddy System Studios ("Robot Chicken") to produce the series, which will combine live action and animation and is set to debut in late January.

Los Angeles - Buzznet, a music-focused social media site, has raised as much as $25 million in its third round of financing, from investors including Universal's Interscope Records, PaidContent reports.

I know we should probably not look to the German music market as indicative of world taste, after all they love David Hasselhoff's odd baritone, but Universal Germany's teen band Tokio Hotel is an interesting phenomenon. They have sold nearly 3 million CDs and DVDs in their homeland in a time when kids get most of their music from the Internet. With four number one singles and two number one albums (the band members were between 13 and 15 years old when recorded their first album) they've become the biggest act to come out of Germany in 20 years.