In April, social music making platform BandLab revealed that it raised $65 million in a Series B round, with a post-money valuation of $315 million.
Today, Singapore-based BandLab has announced a milestone of 50 million users on its platform, up from 30 million users in March 2021.
In addition to today’s user number update, BandLab has also announced a new initiative called the Creator Grant.
This grant will total USD $60,000, and will be awarded to select individuals on BandLab, who the platform says “have shown great growth and resourcefulness in their efforts to reach new musical heights”.
BandLab’s inaugural Creator Grant will see an initial five creators benefit from the initiative.
Recipients include 14-year-old viral TikTok rapper Cl4pers, producer MJbeats, Tracklanta winners Ilene and TWIN, and the YouTube [1,300 articles]” href=”https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/companies/youtube/”>YouTube content creator behind BandLab rapper reactions KngWilo.
BandLab is the flagship product of BandLab Technologies, a division of Singapore-based Caldecott Music Group ( Capitol Music Group [356 articles]” href=”https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/companies/universal-music-group/capitol-music-group/”>CMG), which also owns Vista Musical Instruments and NME Networks, which counts publications such as NME, Uncut and Guitar.com amongst its roster of brands.
The BandLab Technologies division also includes professional-level digital audio workstation, Cakewalk.
BandLab Technologies, the Singapore-based parent company of music making app BandLab rebranded as Caldecott Music Group ( Capitol Music Group [392 articles]” href=”https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/companies/universal-music-group/capitol-music-group/”>CMG) in December.
BandLab’s Series B round was led by Vulcan Capital, the multi-billion-dollar investment arm of Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Paul G. Allen, with participation from Caldecott Music Group and K3 Ventures, a venture capital firm that was an early backer of super app Grab and tech giant Bytedance.
“We set out to democratize music creation and give people with interest in creating music the opportunity to do so and to thrive while doing it.”
Meng Ru Kuok, BandLab
“Our goal with Creator Grant is to support and further creator development by giving funds for them to invest in their own creative process,” said BandLab CEO & Co-founder, Meng Ru Kuok.
“We see this potentially funding production equipment or a new instrument, social ads or a marketing campaign. There’s absolutely no obligation from BandLab as to content ownership, we are just truly here to support the creator in their journey.”
Added Kuok: “We set out to democratize music creation and give people with interest in creating music the opportunity to do so and to thrive while doing it.
“We feel we’re still just getting started, but are extremely proud of having brought 50M people together to enjoy the music making process.”Music Business Worldwide