Muzooka Raises $3M In Series A To Expand, Shift Focus To Music Data Exploration

Muzooka, a cross-platform music discovery tool that connects artists and producers through crowdsourcing, raised $3 million in a Series A-1 round, bringing the total capital raised to $3.6 million.

Muzooka, which has been around for two years, has been trying to improve the way independent artists meet industry professionals. Artists post their own music on the platform, which you can access via the web, Android or iOS, and members rank them and their music. Highly ranked songs or artists get attention from a panel of music-industry aficionados.

Many music services, such as Rdio or Spotify, let you rank artists or songs with the intent to find you more music in similar genres, but Muzooka is strictly focused on building a better bridge to connect producers and independent artists.

The company will use the newly raised funds to expand staff, focus on data exploration and on its mobile services. Muzooka says it has hired more than 20 experienced industry members, including Ron Sakamoto, a concert promoter who will join the company’s board of directors.

Right now the user base seems on the low-end given that votes on artists and music are sparse, but Shawn Wilson, CEO and co-founder, says he believes membership will grow with more content and artists. Muzooka has thousands of artists on the platform with about 5,000 songs, and is continuing to focusing on growth.

“We see this as giving the industry guys better data to take better bets,” Wilson said.