The road to 10 great music startups…
Since announcing Techstars Music* a month ago, it’s been non-stop action. Thousands of emails. Hundreds of applications. Forty-six in-person meetings. Ten flights. Nearly 100 phone calls. Deep strategy sessions about the future of music with our member companies SONOS, Warner Music Group, Harmonix, Bill Silva Entertainment, Young Guru’s Era Of The Engineer, Silva Artist Management, SONY Music, and Q’Prime Management.
All this in service of finding and investing in the 1o most interesting music startups anywhere on Earth. And yes, I have a few updates to share on this front already. More about that in a minute. :)
But first, it’s time to announce my office hours tour, which starts this Friday in Los Angeles and wraps up December 5th in Paris. Come say “hello!” or “bonjour!” or “hallo!” and tell us all about your awesome companies.
TECHSTARS MUSIC OFFICE HOURS:
Friday, Nov. 11 — Los Angeles
Tuesday, Nov. 15 — New York City
Monday, Nov. 28 — London, England
Tuesday, Nov. 29 — London, England
Thursday, Dec. 1 — Berlin, Germany
Friday, Dec. 2 — Berlin, Germany
Monday, Dec. 5 — Paris, France
To book a slot, fill out the meeting request Form HERE.
Yes, you have to use the form to book a meeting. It keeps things organized! We also strongly recommend you watch the video at the top of this post, and then read THIS ARTICLE and THIS WEBSITE. That way, when we meet, we can just talk about your company and how we might work together. ;)
Now, a few words about what we’ve seen, and what we’re looking for:
- So far, 17% of our applications are from outside the U.S.A. We’d like that number to be 30% before we close applications on December 11.
- Our member companies are more interested in building new revenue streams than optimizing existing businesses. “Let’s get out of the pennies and into the dollars!” just might be the best line from our strategy sessions thus far.
- Is the basic human need for shared, communal listening a big opportunity or a total red herring? We’re still arguing.
- If we have one company in the program that needs to license music for its business to work, that will be a lot. We’re focused elsewhere.
- Where are the awesome e-commerce companies?
- Who is inventing a game where the object is to create real music that people love and listen to in the real world?
OK, so that’s enough for now. I’ve made a commitment to post here once a week, so see you back here on Monday the 14th. If you have cool stuff for me to see in the meantime, questions about the program or restaurant tips for the cities above, hit me @bobmoz on Twitter.
\m/
-bob
*ABOUT TECHSTARS MUSIC
Techstars Music is a three-month, mentorship-driven startup accelerator program. Each year, we will invest $120k each in 10 music related startups from around the world. We’ll also provide office space in Los Angeles and access to artists and executives from all facets of the global music business. To help us find and mentor this new crop of startups, we’ve enlisted some of the leading companies in music to help us build and run the program:
PS — I really struggled to find the right musical reference for this post.
It’s both too easy, and really hard:
“On The Road Again?”
“I’ve Been Everywhere?”
“No Sleep ’Til Brooklyn?”
“Travelin’ Band?”
“King Of The Road?”
“Wherever I May Roam?”
“Torn And Frayed?”
“Day After Day?”
Actually… I do know, it’s this one:
