Big buying opportunity is music to Sherrese Clarke Soares' ears
Since its launch in 2021, HarbourView Equity Partners has been in the forefront of investing in music royalties and copyrights reports Iris Dorbian. Backed by Apollo, the Newark, New Jersey, PE firm has acquired over 45 music catalogs to date and a portfolio comprising 20,000-plus songs that spans multiple genres, eras and artists. HarbourView’s acquisitive fervor doesn’t seem to be abating any time soon. In October, the firm generated headlines when it announced it was scooping up select music royalties of pop/rock icons Christine McVie, Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo. The ink was barely dry on these deals when a week later the buyout shop said it was snapping up certain publishing assets of popular award-winning country singer/songwriter Kane Brown.
HarbourView’s success is attributable to founder and CEO Sherrese Clarke Soares, a veteran investor in the music and entertainment sector. Prior to launching the PE firm, Clarke Soares was the founder and CEO of Tempo Music, a music rights investment platform backed by Providence Equity Partners. She also founded and led Morgan Stanley’s entertainment, media and sports structured solutions.
Iris spoke with Clarke Soares as part of an ongoing series of Q&As with private equity thought leaders conducted by PE Hub and PE Hub Europe.
Here’s an excerpt from the interview:
What is it about music royalties that makes you so bullish?
I think one of the things people don’t often appreciate is how important music is to the human condition. Most people on a given day have intersected with music without even trying. That part of the human condition is irreplaceable with respect to other content. That is why it makes us so bullish and there is real legacy.
What’s really nice the way the space is structured now is that technology has enabled audiences to choose what they want as opposed to being spoon-fed. The democratization of music from a tech perspective gives a long tail to how music is consumed and how long lasting it can be.
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What do you see as the opportunities or trends in the music copyright/royalty sector in 2024?
You will see a lot of these small skills aggregators looking to try to get some liquidity. You’ll see some scale back coming to market. I think that will bode well for the underlying value of the asset class. We do think there will be some exits in the space in the near term.
For more of PE Hub’s ongoing series of Q&As with private equity thought leaders, see:
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