• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, January 24, 2007

Despite the sudden recent departure of CEO Robin Kent, ad-supported online music company SpiralFrog still plans to launch early this year, chairman and founder Joe Mohen said Wednesday.

Kent, former CEO of Universal McCann, served as SpiralFrog's CEO from July through December, when he was ousted. After he left the company, several other executives and board members also resigned. "Sometimes you need to shuffle the deck a little bit," Mohen said.

Mohen said the company has replenished its executives and board members in the last month. Its most recent addition came Friday night, when it added former WB Network chief Jordan Levin to the board of directors, Mohen said. "We wanted somebody who understood the demographic," he said. The now-defunct WB Network catered to the same under-35 age group that SpiralFrog aims for.

SpiralFrog has deals with Universal Music, BMI and some independent labels to offer ad-supported downloads of their catalogs. It will take users about 90 seconds to download music tracks, during which time they will be shown online ads.

Although the company was originally slated to launch in December, a combination of technical difficulties and artist compensation issues have held up the debut, Mohen said.