Investing $200 Million In Music with Matt Pincus Trapital

One of the most successful entrepreneurs in the music industry is, without question, Matt Pincus. He sold his independent music publishing company, SONGS, for $160 million five years ago. And now, the music holdings company he co-founded, MUSIC, just raised $200 million to invest in music and music-adjacent companies. 

Though, Matt doesn’t see MUSIC as an investment fund, but rather a holding company. That’s because he takes an operator-centric role in the companies he funds. And unlike the splashy catalog acquisitions that’ve dominated the space over the past few years, Matt is looking forward with his investments and targeting brand-new growth opportunities instead.

In particular, Matt sees big opportunities in the technology sector, web3, and even record labels and publishing. At SONGS, Matt was able to spot and develop up-and-coming songwriters, inking early deals with the likes of Diplo, Lorde, and The Weeknd. He’ll be tasked with finding similar success at MUSIC.  

Matt and I dove deep into a wide-range of topics during our conversation. Here’s a few highlights of what we covered:

[2:58] Why Matt created MUSIC
[8:07] MUSIC’s investment thesis?
[14:40] What Matt doesn’t like about the music business 
[19:49] Recent inflow of capital into the music business
[21:15] Two lanes to entering music business
[25:15] Finding left-of-center opportunities among musical talent 
[27:30] The structural problem of the music business
[31:35] Continuity was key to SONGS success
[33:34] The Weeknd as a business blueprint for other artists
[37:53] Sync business opportunities 
[44:55] Have streaming subscriptions peaked?
[47:50] Tiktok brought back music frequency
[51:40] Matt’s five-year predictions


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Host: Dan Runcie, @RuncieDan, trapital.co

Guests: Matt Pincus, @mpinc
 
 
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TRANSCRIPTION
[00:00:00] Matt Pincus: Defensibility in the music business is not a patent or a technology or some special recipe you have someplace. It's your understanding of music, the people that make it, and then your ability to develop relationships with people around the business and to keep your reputation such that people want to be with you. But the real key in, at least in the music technology side of it is you need to be able to spin the technology yourself and understand really how it works. 
[00:00:37] Dan Runcie: Hey, welcome to The Trapital podcast. I'm your host and the founder of Trapital, Dan Runcie. This podcast is your place to gain insights from executives in music, media, entertainment, and more, who are taking hip-hop culture to the next level. 
[00:00:56] Dan Runcie: Today's episode is with one of the most successful music entrepreneurs of the past few decades. His name is Matt Pincus and he is the founder and CEO of MUSIC, which is a holding company that invests in music tech and music-adjacent companies. MUSIC just launched a 200 million fund to invest in this space, so Matt and I talked all about it. He's looking for companies that still have a clear understanding for how music gets made and understand the art behind it. He's also looking for startups that have a true defensible moat that is something unique that they can do. And he's also looking for the companies that have a huge total addressable market that c