Midemlab: 10 Years Of Music and Music Tech Innovation

This year marks the tenth year of Midemlab, a startup competition put on by Midem. Here we look at ten of the contests greatest success stories from the past ten years.

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Guest Post by Melina Druga on Midem In this series of posts from Reportlinker, we review the latest music+tech news, with one big statistic per news item. All you need to know, in figures!This year marks the 10^th anniversary of Midemlab, Midem’s startup competition. The competition has awarded innovation in the digital music industry and recognised the potential of countless music+tech companies, including SoundCloud, The EchoNest & BandPage, to name just three.Let’s look at 10 Midemlab success stories by the numbers:2008: The year Midemlab began, although the competition was called The New Business Showcase (and subsequently MidemNet Lab), and it had no winner. Finalist Reactable has since been showcased in more than 150 concerts and has been used by many big-name artists such as Bjorkand Coldplay 175 million: The number of users 2009 winner SoundCloud has per month. Since its founding, SoundCloud has raised $123.3 million in funding. Five years after wowing the Midem crowd, the company was worth $700 million$1 billion: The amount 2010 finalist Kickstarter has seen members pledge in funding to 73,000 creative projects since its launch. The pledged funds were raised by 7.4 million members70%: The percentage of the music industry 2011 winner Next Big Sound provides data for. That same year, the company raised $6.5 million in funding. It follows more than 3.3 billion fan-to-band connections and more than one million music artists10 million: The number of concert tickets sold by 2012 finalist Weezevent since its launch to more than 36,000 users. In addition to being a Midemlab finalist, Weezevent was named one ofHypebot’s Top 15 best-music apps for 2012 and was the top company on the 2014 Deloitte Technology Fast 504 million: The number of songs in 2013 finalist Pulselocker’s music catalogue. The company has deals with 27,000 independent record labels and approximately 60 different aggregators. A deal with Merlin, the largest indie company, doubled Pulselocker’s catalogue. Merlin oversees 20,000-plus distributors and labels$6 million: The amount 2015 finalist Dice raised in Series A funding. The app also finalised a deal with Apple Music to give people an alternate way to enter a contest to win Apple Music Festival tickets. The British startup is installed on 40% of London smartphones owned by Millennials and has sold tickets to concerts for more than 700 artists2 Million SEK: The amount of investment recently raised by 2016 winner, Sweden’s Mind Music Labs. Its investors are all keenly interested in Mind Music Lab’s SENSUS smart guitar. The guitar represents the evolution of instruments. In this world of AR and VR, stage musicians still use technology from the 1950s, the company says. The investment brings the company one step closer to bringing its guitar to the market. Two million also is the number of hits the company received in one week for its first music video, a demonstration of SENSUS700%: 2016 winner Stagelink’s growth between October 2015 and October 2016. During that period, the staff increased by 10 and the company sold one million tickets. Stagelink crowdsources live events and promotes tours. In June, it completed its most recent round of investing and plans to use the funds to expand internationally.$2.5 million: The amount 2016 finalist Revelator raised in its latest round of funding. The company provides data analytics and rights administration for digital assets. It plans to use the funding to grow its platform and add new features.To join these amazing music startups, look no further: submit your company for Midemlab 2017 here! With huge thanks to our faithful partners, MusicAlly & bluenove Top photo: © Champeaux/Image & CoMelina Druga is an author and freelance journalist. You can follow her on Twitter @MelinaDruga.