Nigeria’s first domestically launched music streaming service, uduX has developed a new product called PopRev in partnership with PiggyVest.
PopRev will allow music lovers to invest in their favourite musician’s project and make profits based on the project’s digital streaming performance. The solution will see fans become more instrumental to the financial success of the favourite artists.
Fans can track their investment through the uduX platform which is available as both web and mobile apps. The apps will give them real-time insights into the streaming performance of the music they invested in. Fans can also invite other people to listen to the artist’s music on uduX. Whatever revenue is made from the music is shared with the concerned investors.
As the financial partner for the product, PiggyVest, which has a platform of over 2 million active customers, already helps their users save and invest money. With PopRev, PiggyVest and uduX are concerned with offering artists a chance to get more money to create while giving fans a chance to play a part in a musician’s success story.
Afrobeats artist Davido has hailed the platform as timely and needful adding that “An initiative like PopRev will afford a lot of creators who, for example, struggled through the lockdown, the privilege to create without concerns of funding.”
Chidi Okeke, uduX’s CEO, said, “It’s about sharing. Creating meaningful experiences that people can connect with and root for. The music industry has continuously failed to innovate, and this has nothing to do with a lack of technology. The problem with innovation in this space is the lack of incentives.
PopRev gives artists access to funding while letting them keep their masters. We’re creating a new artist revenue model driven by fans’ social engagement and the new normal of ‘sharing’. We want to give investors access to metrics and the performance of their investments on-demand. For the wider industry, we’re providing a leg-up to the untapped potential of musical talent in the African diaspora.”
Somto Ifezue, CEO of PiggyVest had this to say, “uduX is a very innovative solutions platform within the music ecosystem and we’re thrilled to work with them. This is a music business solution that builds equity for African artists and it will be very attractive to our investors. We believe this product will help shape a new business model of revenue generation and open up the market for more data-driven investment.”
With a vision to help the overall development of musical artists – making their music even more valuable investments – PopRev will also operate with trusted experts and partners who will provide value-added services to the concerned artists. Some of these partners include MAD Solutions, a digital content distributor; Made in Africa, a management company; and Pushing Good Music (PGM), a music curation community led by Douglas Jekan, head of music at Beat FM.
Speaking on the ultimate goal of the product, Jekan said “It’s always been about empowering the artist. How do we make it so that at the end of the day, even if they’re not topping the charts, they have catalogues to look back on that they and their family can eat from.”
The first round of artist investment opportunities via PopRev will be announced soon.
