off. In June 2000, the company closed its London office to cut costs. In July 2000, Bertelsmann Music Group acquired the company, intending to combine it with its BMG Direct record club as a new venture called BeMusic, and eventually add Napster to the service. Bertelsmann paid just $117million, a price that was down over 90% from the valuation of the company at its peak in April 1998. The founding Olim brothers received a total of $17million. In April 2001, the company cut 40 employees, 10% of its staff. In August 2001, the company closed its Japanese website and laid off 200 employees. In November 2002, Bertelsmann announced it would close CDnow's Fort Washington facility and lay off the company's remaining 33 employees. Later that month, they signed a deal to outsource CDnow website operations to Amazon. The new deal retained a revised version of the BMG Direct model called the "Preferred Buyers Club", offering a 20% discount for club-edition records; all other music was sold at standard Amazon prices. In 2011, the CDnow.com URL was redirected to a maintenance notice, and in 2013, it was permanently taken offline. References Further reading The CDnow Story: Rags to Riches on the Internet by Jason Olim and Matthew Olim 1994 establishments in Pennsylvania 1998 initial public offerings 2000 mergers and acquisitions American companies established in 1994 Retail companies established in 1994 Internet properties established in 1994 Retail companies disestablished in 2000 Defunct retail companies of the United States Dot-com bubble