Robb McDaniels

Summit Session: Meet the Investors: The Investor Perspective

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Robb McDaniels has made a career out of building businesses that solve problems for the rapidly evolving music industry.  His first venture, Ingrooves Music Group, was launched in 2002. Ingrooves leveraged its enterprise software platform to manage the wholesale digital distribution of music and video files for record labels and artists around the world. Ingrooves eventually grew to become a full-service distribution and artist services operation and took over management of the North American digital distribution for Universal Music Group, the largest label group in the world.  At the time of Robb’s departure in 2014, Ingrooves had grown to manage more than 4 million songs for thousands of artists and labels, launched a highly successful artist services platform, and one of the first e-book distribution operations in the digital industry (Inscribe Digital).  

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With Ingrooves’s course firmly set, Robb was free to get back to his entrepreneurial roots and think about building another great music company that would solve real world issues.  While serving as a Venture Partner for Dubai-based investment company, TechInvest, Robb began to construct an idea to disrupt the world of talent management. In early 2016, Robb launched Faction Entertainment and soon released a beta version of its productivity mobile app called “Faction X” that allowed artists to create their own “Factions” and invite key business partners to join and collaborate.  By 2017, Faction was one of the fastest growing music management companies in the world, but Robb’s heart was being pulled in a different direction.

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In October of 2017, Robb made the leap to become the CEO of Beatport, while maintaining the role of Executive Chairman at Faction. Founded in 2004 as the principal source of music for DJs, Beatport has rapidly expanded its footprint and has become the de facto home for all types of DJs, producers and their fans.  The Beatport Group has made several acquisitions to broaden its product portfolio, including Pulselocker, DJcity, Loopmasters, Plugin Boutique,  Ampsuite, Label Radar, and the International Music Summit.  The company has also taken a leadership position in bridging the music industry to Web3 and the metaverse, with several successful NFT drops and virtual events.  The company now has three business units, Creator Services, Music Services and Media Services, and 165 employees around the world.

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Over the years Robb has earned a reputation as an industry thought leader on evolving streaming models, ongoing regulatory battles, and emerging technologies.  In an industry rife with corporate lifers who have opinions but rarely the courage to express them, Robb has been an outspoken defender of artist rights. Robb’s consistent leadership position in the digital media industry can be illustrated by his naming to Billboard’s “International Power Players” list in April 2022.  Going back to 2013 he was named to Billboard magazine’s “40 under 40 – Power Players on the Rise” for the second consecutive year and was also named to Digital Media Wire’s “25 Executives to Watch in Digital Media” in 2010.

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Robb’s innovative thinking has resulted in feature stories in Rolling Stone, Billboard, Forbes, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Business Week, Entrepreneur and many other leading publications, as well as speaking engagements at many of the industry’s top conferences.

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Born in London to American parents, Robb attended Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut as well as the London School of Economics.  He is currently based between the Beatport offices in London, UK and Los Angeles, CA.

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