Smule is an app maker turned music social network. The company is pushing to expand its footprint in India, which the article identifies as its second-largest international market. Management says engaging India requires building a platform for a massive, multi-lingual market. Financially, Smule raised a $20M strategic investment from Times Bridge, following a $54M raise in May of the prior year led by Tencent. Times Bridge is the VC wing of The Times Group and its investment is the firm's first full social media partnership. Times Bridge will leverage connections with local artists and provide targeted marketing to advance Smule's growth across the Indian subcontinent. Smule builds social music apps, including Sing! Karaoke, that let users share musical performances with others. The company reports 52 million monthly active users. CEO Jeff Smith has said his vision is to "build a social network around music" and to help promote music. Smule raised capital to fuel international growth, with a stated focus on expanding in Asia. Reuters reported the recent financing valued the company at $604 million, and the company may pursue a public offering in the future. Smule operates a social network for musical performance powered by a family of mobile apps including Ocarina, Magic Piano, Sing! Karaoke, Guitar! and AutoRap. The company says over 300 million people across seven continents have used its products and its community performs about 12 million songs per day, uploading roughly 1 to 1.5 terabytes of content daily and totaling about 4 billion songs a year from roughly 25 million users. Smule reported revenue doubled year‑over‑year in 2014 to $40 million, with about 350,000 subscribers representing 85% of sales. The company plans to use the newly raised funds to invest in marketing, product development and international expansion. Smule emphasizes iterative R&D and aims to transform music from a passive to an engaging, participatory experience. Founded in 2008 and based in San Francisco, Smule positions itself as a market leader redefining musical performance for consumers. Smule builds popular social music applications that let users create, share, and perform music together, including Sing! Karaoke and Magic Piano. The company launched Smule Nation to enable cross-app performance sharing and has seen website traffic triple to about 1.5 million monthly unique visitors. Smule reported strong growth in 2014: sales doubled in Q1 2014 versus Q1 2013, monthly unique users doubled from 9 million to 18 million, and it is at a $30 million run rate for the year. Revenue is primarily subscription-driven (about 80%), with the remaining 20% from advertising, and the company says it is break-even on monthly cash flow. Smule plans continued product development, international expansion beginning with Asia, and intends to launch new products while basing projections on growth of existing offerings. CEO Jeff Smith has stated an ultimate goal to take the company public, though there are no definite plans. Smule develops mobile social music applications and is known for titles including I Am T-Pain, Ocarina, Leaf Trombone, Glee Karaoke, MadPad, and Magic Fiddle. Its products are connected via the company’s Sonic Network, a social fabric that the article says includes over 200 million songs created by users. The company raised $12 million in a new funding round, and previously had raised $13.5 million. Leadership says evidence validating the business model and market opportunity prompted more aggressive steps to dominate the mobile social music market. Earlier in the year Smule said it would double its staff in 2011, indicating planned growth. Smule was founded in 2008 by Jeffrey C. Smith, Dr. Ge Wang, and a group of Stanford and Princeton music PhDs and developers.

Total raised

$153M

Funding rounds

8

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Oct 2018