Music industry funding fell by over 77% in April of 2024. Photo Credit: Mackenzie Marco
Music industry funding fell 77.4% year-over-year in April of 2024, with deal-flow dropping substantially according to DMN Pro’s Music Industry Funding Tracker. Overall, the number of rounds decreased from nine to two, with year-to-date funding approaching $1.3 billion.
These and other telling stats come from DMN Pro’s Music Industry Funding Tracker, a one-stop searchable database featuring detailed information about raises announced in (and immediately around) the music space. Overall, April of 2024 delivered just $10.6 million in industry funding, a relatively paltry level by early-2020s standards.
April’s relatively modest sum is attributable to KAI Media’s $3 million raise and the $7.6 million strategic round that Superlogic revealed about two weeks ago. The funding disclosure from the latter company, formerly known as OneOf, has largely flown under the radar in industry circles.
Overall, year-to-date funding is approximately $1.286 billion. At the same point in 2023, music industry fund had topped $4.24 billion.
OneOf, which counts Quincy Jones as a backer, has attracted ample customer criticism and complaints centering chiefly on claims that NFTs sold via the platform had failed to honor key promises. (Former Warner Music head Stephen Cooper, previously part of OneOf’s board, has signed on as a member of Superlogic’s board as well.)
Shifting from the OneOf-to-Superlogic pivot and returning to music funding changes, April of 2023 brought a comparatively substantial nine industry raises, including Rock the Bells’ $15 million Series B, a $5 million seed round for POSH, and an $11 million pre-Series A for Enote.
All told, the capital associated with those nine rounds finished at $46.85 million – with the April of 2024 sum therefore representing the initially mentioned 77.4% slip. Worth noting, however, is that last month also saw Cutting Edge Group refinance $500 million in debt; the move, while significant, doesn’t constitute a raise and is therefore absent from the funding total.
So is the up to $100 million offering that Reservoir Media is plotting, according to SEC filings, and the undisclosed grant secured by AudioStrip. In short, major capital tranches are floating around despite the clear-cut April funding decline.
What, then, is driving the slowdown?
Though it’s impossible to say for certain, dramatically higher interest rates as well as cooling web3 and AI sectors (at least in terms of funding) come to mind. Additionally, as we previously explored, industry funding across all of 2024 is lagging when compared to 2023.
Furthermore, it’s worth considering the many massive raises that came to fruition during 2024’s first three months, including for companies like Beatdapp ($17 million in January), Gamma ($100 million in February), Duetti ($90 million in February), and Iconic Artists Group ($1 billion in February).
Funding has hardly dried up altogether, and it’s possible that May could usher in a spike from the same period in 2023. But it won’t be easy, as the prior-year period’s dozen industry rounds totaled a staggering $933.95 million. That gargantuan sum includes Sound Ventures’ $240 million AI fund and Anthropic’s $450 million Series C – still leaving a sizable amount of funding specifically in the industry.
The Music Industry Funding Tracker is DMN Pro’s subscriber-only database that tracks rounds big and small, complete with details about specific rounds (pre-seed to late-stage), investors (both lead and supporting), and dollar commitments involved. The database covers hundreds of investments over multiple years and offers a valuable resource for anyone placing or receiving growth bets in the music industry.
