Music tech start-up Fairphonic appoints Gavin Parry as chairman
Former executive vice president of Sony Music Asia Pacific has joined Fairphonic as chairman.
Fairphonic is a start-up which wants to revolutionise digital rights management.
Its AI Audio Fingerprint (AIFP) can identify unclaimed masters, live recordings, covers, user-generated content and reproduction content across social media and music platforms. It aims to instil a ‘Fair Play, Fair Pay’ system between artists, labels, writers and publishers across the digital landscape.
Tang Heng Yang, Fairphonic’s CEO, said the organisation was extremely happy to welcome Parry to the board.
“[Parry] brings with him 20 years of experience in the digital music space having developed the digital music business in the Asia Pacific region with Sony Music from its earliest beginnings,” he said. “We look forward to applying his technology and business acumen as we grow the platform.”
Parry said having worked with Fairphonic for a short time, he was already super impressed with what it was achieving.
“In a recent trial for one of the largest Asian music labels, Fairphonic was able to identify 1 billion unclaimed views from just a 20-track sample,” he explained.
“As digital music continues to accelerate in all its forms, having a great partner that can protect your copyright 24/7 will become an essential service. With music now seen as an investment grade asset, returns to owners and investors must be fully optimised and Fairphonic has the technology to achieve this.”
In addition to the Parry appointment, Fairphonic announced a new strategic partnership with Ordior, a NSW regional music label distribution business.
Fairphonic said Ordior, based in the Southern Highlands, has 100-plus label clients and had “developed a significant competency and a battle-hardened team for collecting unclaimed royalties for labels and artists across the globe”.
Damien Reilly, CEO of Ordior, said he was excited about the partnership with Fairphonic.
“Our two companies go hand in hand, with Fairphonic using its unique technology to identify revenue opportunities and unclaimed royalties, and then for Ordior to use our experienced staff, systems and forensic processes to maximise the collections,” Reilly said.
Parry noted Ordior’s local advantages.
“Many of the technology players in rights management have back end teams in South East Asia or India which have mixed results. What we have achieved with this partnership, is a back end team for Fairphonic that is well trained, experienced, cost effective and supported. As Fairphonic grows we expect that Ordior will launch offices in other NSW regional centres, providing high quality employment to youth in those communities”.