Social Music Platform Humit Raises Pre-Seed Funding From Antler India The startup aims to reinvent music sharing and discovery by leveraging community and social tastemaking
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Social music app Humit on Monday informed to have raised a pre-Seed round of funding led by Antler India.
Humit is a social music app that is reimagining the way people discover, share and express themselves with their taste in music. It makes engaging with music a social-first experience by letting users share the most powerful moments from their favorite songs, create micro-communities and engage with fellow music lovers in completely new ways. Unlike traditional streaming platforms that use algorithms to serve up recommendations, Humit relies on a community-driven approach where music is discovered and shared on user moderated channels called "stations'. The platform is currently home to 500 stations created by users across 42 countries.
"Music has an intrinsically social aspect to it. In fact, one's taste in music is often considered brag-worthy. However, no product has yet been able to truly complete the feedback loop for the social sharing of music. With Humit, we are decoding the nuances of sharing music recommendations with a friend, and what it means to be able to express yourself through your taste in music. This is a core desire, and what we believe will scale globally. A shared taste in music is known to be one of the best icebreakers and we are working on designing unique experiences around this," said Rohit Ganapathy, co-founder and head of product, Humit.
Founded in 2020 by BITS Pilani graduates and music lovers Rohit Ganapathy, Prithvi Sankar, and Ishaan Negi, the idea of Humit took shape after the trio realized that existing social platforms used for sharing music were not ideal for audio consumption. Humit provides an audio-focused social media experience for Spotify users, with integrations across Apple Music, YouTube Music, and SoundCloud currently in the works.
The app for music lovers is getting traction in India, the US, and other global markets.
"We are working on clever design and tech interventions that can lead to serendipitous ways of discovering some great music. We have several examples of super fans and folks who've never met each other before, building cross-border friendships by discovering each other's music stations. This is truly rewarding to see, and tells us we are onto something special," stated Prithvi Sankar, co-founder, Humit.
Humit's pre-Seed round was led by Antler, with co-investments from First Cheque led by Farooq Adam (co-founder, Fynd), and angels such as Alagu Periyannan (CTO, Bluejeans), Sarath Sura (co-founder, Sierra Atlantic), Ankit Mathuria (CTO, Oyo Rooms), Shivakumar Ganesan (co-founder, Exotel), Gajendra Jangid (co-founder, CARS24), Kshitij Khandelwal (co-founder, Pixxel) among others.
"Indian techpreneurs are "building in India, for the world', which we believe will be one of the biggest trends to watch. Humit is pushing boundaries, and setting up new social constructs around music that has the potential to change consumer behavior and create a new category where none existed before," added Rajiv Srivatsa, partner, Antler.
Earlier this year, global early-stage VC firm Antler announced a full-fledged launch in India plans to deploy $100 million in over 100 Indian startups over the next 3 years.