Lakeba Group Invests in LUM

Currently only available on iOS in the United States, LÜM is an ad-free social media, music discovery and streaming application. It enables emerging artists the ability to circulate their music and grow their fanbase. The LÜM platform focuses exclusively on emerging artists, increasing artist-to-fan and fan-to-fan engagement.

“Almost everyone at one point has the dream of becoming a Rockstar. But, achieving that dream is only a possibility for the very few, with so many local talents going undiscovered and unfunded. LÜM provides a new model that opens up new pathways for emerging artists to turn their dream into a living,” says Giuseppe Porcelli, CEO at Lakeba Group.

For creative artists, the music industry remains dominated by major record labels, which clusters music earnings to a few global artists. In the music streaming industry, less than 1% of artists earn any real income from fans streaming their music. 

“Even before COVID-19, the world was at risk of losing its creative talents. Major music streaming services are not geared toward helping emerging and local artists get discovered, grow their fanbase or fund their musical endeavours. This leaves many to take up alternative vocations to survive,” said Max Fergus, CEO at LÜM.

“COVID-19 has accelerated the demise of the existing model, closing the doors to discoverability and profitability on artists the world over. Live music venues remain closed, limiting their potential of discovery and ability to connect with fans. With Lakeba, we aim to quickly scale our platform across operating systems and countries. We want to give this generation of artists and fans a new digital community based on human connection and reciprocity.”

Recently, LÜM launched its in-app currency – Notes – which enables fans to support their favourite emerging artists directly. Within the first two months since the launch of LÜM’s virtual currency, over 13,000 artists have received direct support from fans. Over 20,000,000 Notes have been gifted to artists. As such, LÜM has conceived, created and commercialised a connected community of emerging artists, listeners and music curators. 

The next phase of growth for LÜM is to open up the platform to the more than 2.5 billion active Android devices, and to continue to pursue additional tools for artists to monetize and grow a dedicated base of fans. 

“We’re already seeing the power of connection between fans and artists transform the music discovery experience in the US. Now, we’re excited to scale the platform across the globe, after all, music has no borders giving our platform exponential growth potential,” says Fergus.

“It’s a massive deal. One of the most diverse collaborations happening in the world of fintech. LÜM is removing the frictions between artists and their fans. Lakeba eradicates the frictions from financial transactions that make the world go around. Combined, there’s an opportunity to realise fandom for finances, enriching the connections between brands and customers,” concludes Porcelli.

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About Lakeba

Lakeba builds businesses that are optimised for high returns from low investment, at low risk when compared with the start-up sector. It utilises proprietary artificial intelligence (AI), decades of business and technology experience, and scalable shared services, to support each phase of business building. So far it has ‘conceived, created and commercialised’ 15 ventures, of which three have already been spun-out.

The unique Lakeba AI ‘neural network’ ‘conceives’ opportunities by continually interrogating the internet to establish patterns which suggest a business ‘need’ that could be solved digitally. Its entrepreneurs then double check this analysis and determine the viability of the business idea and its commercial potential.

To ‘create’ a venture, Lakeba works with partners, industry, and the wider innovations ecosystem to create digital technologies that eliminate the frictions identified by the neural network. A team of technologists, designers, and entrepreneurs build out the value proposition and establish the business. Lakeba invests its time, capabilities, capital and resources to craft ideas into reality.

‘Commercialise’ is the final stage of the Lakeba process. Once the digital proof of concept delivers on its promise, it is enhanced with radical intelligence. Working with partners, investors and the customers, Lakeba’s team refines and optimises the operations and distribution to rapidly commercialise the venture. This ensures the business continuously delivers value to customers as it scales and diversifies across industries and the globe.

Lakeba Group was founded by Giuseppe Porcelli, Entrepreneur and Visionary of Future Technology.