Digital Catapult and Sony Music UK unveil ten Black tech entrepreneurs cultivating innovation in digital entertainment

• FutureScope Black Founders Programme launched in April to support early-stage Black tech founders in digital entertainment
• Programme activities include mentoring and investment readiness workshops
• Full details of the cohort and programme community can be found on the FutureScope website

Digital Catapult, the UK authority on advanced digital technology, and Sony Music UK, have announced a cohort of ten pioneering digital-first startups, to participate in the inaugural FutureScope Black Founders Programme. The programme will support Black British entrepreneurs in the digital entertainment space, and encourage the successful commercialisation of their innovative new solutions.

The announcement marks the beginning of the 16-week programme of activities that will provide each early-stage company with business and investment readiness support, drawing on Digital Catapult’s decade of experience supporting UK startups. Through mentorship, workshops and masterclasses, the programme will look to help each startup raise investment in the next six to nine months. In addition, half of the cohort businesses are led by women and half led by men.

Using advanced digital technologies such as distributed ledger technologies, artificial intelligence/machine learning, virtual and/or augmented reality, the cohort provides wide-reaching solutions for art, music, social media, retail and tourism. From a digital fine art gallery made possible by an extended reality (XR) immersive world, to an AI-powered social media platform designed to build a community of music lovers, the innovations at the centre of each business are created to transform the UK’s digital entertainment space and bring the sector into a new era.

The 10 startups joining the FutureScope Black Founders Programme are:

• Cashblack – Cashblack is a platform that rewards members with cashback when they shop online with Black-owned businesses.
• Deya – Deya is a platform for Black creative talent & creative companies, building a new approach for Black creatives to find jobs and community.
• Flossy – Flossy offers tools for users to create remixable merch and products. It leverages AI to allow users to come together and co-create images.
• Happaning Ltd – Happaning is a crowdsourced event preview app. Powered by its patented ViiVid® media format, the app lets a user request trusted, real-time video previews through the eyes of the community.
• Korda – Korda empowers music creators, songwriters and innovators by providing tools that support all stages of the music lifecycle, from creation to monetisation.
• Loud Parade – Loud Parade is an award-winning music creative and sonic branding company that makes bespoke music compositions aimed at Gen Z for brands and creative agencies.
• Musircle – Musircle is an AI-driven social media platform that analyses the listening habits of users to deliver their musical DNA.
• Nyangibo Gallery – Nyangibo Gallery is an online and in-person digital fine art gallery, with a focus on extended reality (XR) art.
• Stories & The City – Stories & The City is a cultural tourism immersive startup that uses augmented reality (AR) and a user’s smartphone to create bespoke cultural city tours.
• Waves – Waves is an AI-powered web3 marketplace for collecting and trading rare beats.

Digital Catapult will deliver the FutureScope Black Founders Programme in partnership with Sony Music UK, with both partners having a long-standing tradition of promoting innovation within the UK’s creative industries. By focusing support toward Black tech entrepreneurs, the programme aims to provide them with knowledge and connections that can lead to future investment opportunities.

FutureScope is Digital Catapult’s deep tech acceleration support system for the UK’s leading tech innovators and businesses. The Black Founders Programme aims to make it easier for Black founders to raise venture capital and successfully scale their solutions, given that research from Atomico, an international investment firm, found that 62% of Black founders have found it increasingly hard to raise venture capital, with only 38 Black founders receiving venture capital funding between 2009 and 2019, just 0.24% of the total sum invested.

To offset costs to a business by participating in the programme, each startup will receive £3,000 as a financial contribution towards completing the programme. This also includes additional support from ‘Musiio by SoundCloud’.

To ensure long-lasting, positive impact is made for the founders and the UK Black tech community, the programme is further bolstered by support from expert consultants and mentors from across the entertainment and tech industries. This includes Sony Music UK and Soundcloud, and nine purpose-driven organisations that promote Black businesses and inclusive opportunities across the UK’s tech startup community.

Notes to editors

Applying to the FutureScope Black Founders Programme is free and no equity is required in exchange for support.

Atomico research on racial imbalance in the start-up sector is is available at https://2020.stateofeuropeantech.com/