Last year Vancouver blockchain music startup Beatdapp won the People’s Choice Award in the New Ventures BC Competition, raised $3.2 million and added prime minister Stephen Harper to their advisory board.
Today they tapped into the music industry and added veteran music executive Bryan Turner to their board. Turner founded Priority Records in 1985 and during his 16 years as Chairman, Priority sold in excess of $1.7 billion of recorded music.
Priority’s claim to fame – they signed N.W.A. and their first release on the label was Straight Outta Compton. Turner later partnered with Interscope Records to distribute Dr. Dre’s The Chronic.
Turner joins Harper, and recent additions James Larus and Joe Galante on Beatdapp’s advisory board.
Using its proprietary blockchain, Beatdapp Software provides a real-time audited play count for song usage across streaming platforms, allowing music labels to accurately collect music royalties due.
Beatdapp Co-CEO Andrew Batey describes it as an estimated $4 billion problem for the global music industry. “Labels have no idea the amount of time the song’s actually being played,” Batey told the Vancouver Courier.
“They have a rough estimate but streaming services self-report.” Batey estimates under-reporting is as high as 30 per cent for some of the streaming services.
Beatdapp’s innovation and potential has been recognized by six top accelerators, including Vancouver-based CDL-West, 500 Startups, and Project Music Portfolio.