The non-fungible token (NFT) music platform Royal has raised $55 million in Series A funding led by venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz also known as a16z.
Other partners that supported Royal are Coinbase Ventures, Paradigm, and Crush music. Notably, the latest funding came less than three months after Royal secured $16 million in a seed round led by Founders Fund and Paradigm. Royal is a platform for music NFTs, allowing others to buy ownership of songs from artists and earn royalties from them.
Several Musicians Contribute to New Royal Funding Round
The startup, though barely four months old, has attracted other crypto-friendly musicians like Blau. This is evident in the celebrities who participated in the Royal funding round, including Nas, The Chainsmokers, Disclosure, Logic, Stefflon Don, Kygo, and Joyner Lucas.
The NFT startup, led by Justin Blau, and JD Ross as co-founder, tested the concept that the platform is set on by giving away 50% of the streaming rights to his latest track, Worst Case. The song reached an implied value of $6 million on Royal’s marketplace after the secondary sales of nearly $600,000 worth of tokens.
It is unclear how Royal wants to address how much control owners will retain over their songs. This may prove a little difficult especially with third-party use and advertising while staying compliant to security laws. These regulatory laws take the position that most cryptocurrencies, including NFTs, are securities and should possibly get permission from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to trade them.
Specifically, a16z co-lead, Katie Haun, led the Royal funding. Haun also happens to belong to the boards of crypto exchange Coinbase and NFT marketplace OpenSea.
In September, Naithan Jones, a former partner at Andreessen Horowitz joined Royal as its head of growth. Jones also managed the Talent X Opportunity Fund.
Royal Platform- Sharing Artist’s Success
In a recent blog post, Blau said the goal of the platform is simple. It shows how tokens can be leveraged to grant music rights on-chains while aligning incentives between fans and artists through co-ownership. This co-ownership is possible by Royal’s NFT, also Limited Digital Assets (LDA).
The platform is based on emerging blockchain technology. Also, it aims to give artists more independence while helping them capture more of the emotional value that music creates. According to Royal, “when artists grow, everyone wins.”
Royal was created by Justin Blau, with the stage name 3LAU. Blau worked with his friend JD Ross to create the platform. Ross is an entrepreneur and the general partner at Atomic, a San Francisco-based studio. The platform currently boasts of 1 billion streams and 3 million monthly listeners.
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