Music Innovation

There was a moment, not that long ago, when music rights acquisitions felt almost mechanical- streaming growth was steady, capital was abundant. The underwriting conversation revolved around a small set of variables: historical cashflow, growth assumptions, discount rate, and multiple. If you believed in the long-term durability and expansion of streaming, the rest followed.

On Spotify’s latest earnings call, there was a few moments, including the quote “Technology is seldom disruptive on its own. Significant disruption happens when new technologies enable new asymmetric business models.” The real question isn’t whether AI is powerful, but whether it enables new business models entirely.

Competitive advantage in music is often framed around ownership, but data provides an equally powerful advantage. Serious operators across the music ecosystem are all looking at broadly the same raw data inputs (keeping in mind last week’s look at how data is no longer a scarce resource)- with cloud infrastructure and AI flattening the technical barriers to entry. Data is no longer the differentiator it once was.

Every industry has its myths- narratives that get repeated so often they start to feel like facts. Music may be one of the most culturally powerful forces in society, but it’s also one of the most misunderstood commercial ecosystems. Misconceptions are often perpetuated by those without years of internal industry experience- not only colouring how the business is perceived (particularly operationally), but also by implication how we think about innovation and investment.

There’s a recurring dichotomy in how music publishing ‘value’ is discussed. The media conversation clusters around the headline acquisition of iconic catalogs and blockbuster songwriters- the “big deals” naturally command attention. They are tangible, easy to explain, and fit the narrative that music IP behaves like a financial asset. However there is also a real engine of value outside those deals that make the music headlines. There is still material revenue to be found ac

AI is leverage like humanity has never seen before- but it is amplifying both signal and noise. AI isn’t creating wisdom- it doesn’t make us smarter, or more insightful, or even necessarily more effective. It is simply scaling what already exists.

In 2017 Google’s AlphaZero defeated the longstanding championship winning Stockfish 8 program at the game of Chess. AlphaZero only learned the game through machine learning, by playing itself. To conquer the world’s most powerful chess engine it only took 4 hours of training. 4 hours vs. the entire accumulation of human knowledge about the game. In Harari’s words- “Because AlphaZero learned nothing from a human, many of its winning moves and strategies seemed unconventional

‘Artificial Intelligence’ is no longer a theoretical technology hovering on the horizon, but is quickly (and with ever increasing speed) being embedded into everyday workflows- powering products and increasingly shaping entire industries. For the music business, as for every other sector, the question is no longer if AI will matter but how it is being applied in practice today- and where it is likely to drive competitive advantage tomorrow.

Imagine trying to value a ring in a jewellery store, but wearing a blindfold. You can sense the outlines, feel the cut of the stone and setting, but the fine detail- the information that actually determines whether you’re about to buy a diamond or a dud- is obscured. That’s where many funds still find themselves today. Investment decisions are often made with incomplete or unreliable data. Acquisition packs are full of disparate (and static) spreadsheets

The music industry has never been short on creativity- but in the smaller Publishing niche it’s often been sadly short on collaboration. Not between songwriters, producers, or artists- but between the organisations, systems, and standards that underpin how the business actually serves these creators. For an industry built on relationships, too much of our data and infrastructure operates like a walled garden.

Books like All You Need to Know About the Music Business (Don Passman) or Music: The Business (Anne Harrison) and other various law primers have certainly become the ‘go tos’ for a reason. Though undoubtedly useful for understanding contracts, rights, and royalties at a granular level, they are also relatively dense as they are so granular.

The pace of change is accelerating. This week we released a new, free tool on the Fix Music website: a clean, simple way to retrieve recording metadata- including ISRCs, artwork, release info and more- from any Spotify link, in downloadable bulk format. No login. No fee. No strings. It’s already helping users save time and get what they need, fast. And… it was entirely built by AI.

In music publishing, advances have long been only the headline number. Over time, terms and models have received scrutiny and subsequently shifted. Gone are the days of 50/50 deals for life of copyright, now supplanted by profit-shares and “at source” accounting. Beyond the terms laid out on paper, creators presently have far more contextual variables to assess. Likelihood of sync placements is one by example- a factor so heavily based on historic performance that is has n

AI is clearly having a moment. Photo by Possessed Photography From image generation to songwriting tools, the emergence of generative AI has sparked widespread debate in the creative industries. In music publishing, much of the discussion has understandably centred around authorship, copyright, and how to safeguard the value of human creativity in a world where machines can mimic it. But that’s only one side of the story. If we zoom out and look beyond the courtroom, AI has t

100,000+ recordings released and 10,000+ songs registered per day. Is this an opportunity, or a data nightmare?