Stockholm-based Freshsound raises €1.3M for its original music licensing platform

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Stockholm-based Freshsound, a licensing platform for original music, announced on Tuesday that it has raised €1.3M in its pre-Seed round of funding from a group of renowned angel investors and family offices.

The funding came from Aligned Ventures; Kristina Tunkrans, former Partner at Cederquist, CEO of PRMD publishing/AtNight and Chief of Music, Epidemic Sound; Shiv Prakash, former VP of Investment, Hipgnosis Song Fund; Marcus Konstantino, Partner at HDR Partners; Gustav Nordlindh, founder of Royal Streaming; and, Kim Fai Kok and Dara Gill of Framtid.

A platform for music synchronisation

As content marketing and streaming services are creating original content, the demand for premium and original music is also increasing. However, the licensing process for original music for commercial purposes (branded material, games, movies, and TV shows) may take many months. This is because the process involves several parties, intricate discussions, and time-consuming administrative work with labels, songwriters, or any rights-holder.

This is where Freshsound looks to make a difference. Founded in 2021 by Stephen Gyasi and Sara Larsson, Freshsound is a licensing platform for original music. It ensures that content creators and storytellers get the “best” possible music for their visual content in a friction-free way.

The company has created an automated pre-cleared licensing platform and a marketplace for original music that removes all the friction of negotiating and lets creators and storytellers instantly licence premium songs for their content. Besides, Freshsound also offers a music discovery tool and a dynamic pricing structure that provides clients with a rate for every usage.

Co-founder Stephen Gyasi says, “The sync and licensing market is still stuck in the pen and paper era, and is yet to be digitised. While it is growing and we see an increased demand for quality music, the process of licensing songs is too complex and time-consuming. This results in songwriters and artists losing out on potential profits, while creators and storytellers are missing the opportunity to get the perfect song for their visual content. We want to ensure that the rights holders remain in full control and ownership of their rights and to make it easier than ever to licence premium music.”

With more than 60 labels and publishers already on board, Freshsound has fully pre-cleared the music and is adding new tracks. The platform has been utilised by major advertising agencies such as McCann and Forsman Bodenfors for their campaigns.

Capital utilisation

Freshsound says that the proceeds will help the company’s plans to rapidly accelerate its commercial expansion, expand its catalogue, product development and R&D, and launch its licensing platform in the Nordics, Germany and the UK.

With a team already drawing from their experience at companies and record labels like Warner Music, V2 Music, Hipgnosis, Spotify, Epidemic Sound, EMI, Sony Music, iZettle, Dassault Systèmes, and BCG, Freshsound will also use the funds to continue onboarding “exceptional” talent to the company.

About Helen McLaughlin?

Co-founder Stephen Gyasi reports that Freshsound has onboarded Helen McLaughlin as its Head of Catalog. “She’s a respected name in the industry that brings enormous experience and know-how to Freshsound,” adds Gyasi.

Helen McLaughlin is a former Managing Director of Warner Music Sweden, Head of A&R at Sony Music Sweden, Head of A&R and Business Development at The Kennel, and CEO at V2 Music Scandinavia. Her responsibility at Freshsound is to lead the expansion of its tracks catalogue.

Helen McLaughlin says, “I have spent more than three decades working in the music industry and seen its pivotal shift from the physical to the digital era. During the last years, artists, labels, composers and publishers have lost huge amounts of business within the sync space to companies offering musical works not registered with public rights organisations – this mainly due to the time-consuming clearance process.”

“I am very humble about the complexity of clearing music, but the need for a tool to make the process quicker and more seamless yet still allowing creators and rights holders to set their own terms and requirements in what context their music should be available for customers is paramount. I am really excited to join the Freshsound team as the platform offers all of this – even allowing it on a track-by-track basis – while keeping the pricing individual and matching available works with whatever the sync customer is looking for,” adds McLaughlin.

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Vishal Singh

Vishal Singh is a News Reporter and Social Media Marketing Lead at Silicon Canals. He covers developments in the European startup ecosystem and oversees the publication's social media presence. Before joining Silicon Canals, Vishal gained experience at the Indian digital media outlet Inc42, contributing to its growth with insightful content. Despite being a college dropout, his passion for writing has driven his career in journalism.

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