Dan Gilbert's innovative digital ticketing company, Veritix, has already set records for paperless tickets to a sporting event and concert -- a Cleveland-Boston NBA game last week and a 2009 Billy Joel-Elton John show in Houston. But can the company, with its much lauded Flash Seats ticketing system, take on the behemoth combination of Ticketmaster and Live Nation?

Yes, insists Sam Gerace, CEO of Veritix. Veritix is much more than a novel upstart and Flash Seats is not only a way to buy a ticket and enter an event simply by swiping a credit card or driver's license -- but also a competitor to StubHub and eBay in the secondary market for reselling tickets. He further explained, to US internet publication, Free Press:

"We've issued more than 2 million digital tickets. We've moved from a novelty to now really seeing the industry adopt this."

But can you buy a ticket via Veritix to a concert or sporting event in Detroit? Nope. Ditto for New York or Los Angeles, or for Major League Baseball or NFL football in any city.

Ticketmaster retains a stranglehold on most U.S. ticketing for concerts and sporting events, because of longstanding relationships with the venues. More so since its merger with promoter and venue operator,  Live Nation. What this means, in markets with more than one big concert venue -- like Chicago, New York or Detroit -- is that artists might be steered to perform in arenas where Ticketmaster reaps the ticketing fees. Instead of an upstart like Veritix, for example.

But Veritix and Ticketmaster have already traded lawsuits (before settling out of court last year) so it could  be intriguing to watch this battle of Gilbert against the ticket world's Goliath.