Music industry funding achieved a substantial year-over-year increase in March 2025. But the month and its 2024 counterpart still recorded fewer combined raises than March 2023. Photo Credit: Giorgio Trovato
Thanks in part to massive raises from catalog investors, core music industry funding turned in a significant YoY jump during March 2025. But at least from a volume perspective, the month (as well as March 2024) lagged behind its 2023 counterpart.
These and other worthwhile takeaways come from data compiled in DMN Pro’s Music Industry Funding Tracker. That one-stop resource features detailed breakdowns of raises from in and around the music world.
On the “around” front, the Funding Tracker distinguishes between core and industry-adjacent raises, both of which are explored below. Any rounds disclosed in foreign currencies were converted into USD at the time of announcement, and those values were left in place for this piece’s calculations.
Core Music Industry Funding Cracked $1.5 Billion in March 2025
All told, music industry funding hiked to $5.08 billion during March 2025, up substantially from March 2024’s $63.52 million, DMN Pro data shows. But as usual, the funding story doesn’t begin and end with the top-level valuation boost.
Most importantly, the lion’s share of the March 2025 sum derived from Anthropic’s $3.5 billion Series E. Less that gargantuan raise and a few others adjacent to the industry proper, the month’s core music funding came in at $1.52 billion.
Even that figure marks a material increase from March 2024, especially given that the prior-year month’s core funding finished at $10.36 million.
The Catalog-Acquisition Boom Isn’t Over Yet – IP Investors Scored Sizable Funding in March 2025
Furthermore, March 2024 didn’t have the benefit of a multibillion-dollar total contribution from the catalog side. However, Pophouse Entertainment confirmed a roughly $1.3 billion catalog fundraise (the majority of which remains undeployed) last month, when Duetti secured $200 million in fresh debt funding.
Minus the combined $1.5 billion in question, core music industry funding totaled $20 million in March 2025 and had an average round size of $6.67 million. The former sum increased about 93% from March 2024’s above-mentioned $10.36 million in core funding. And March 2025’s average round size rose noticeably from the older month’s $3.45 million.
More to the Picture Than Hard Funding: Raise Volume Was Still Down in March 2024 and 2025
With all that said, when it comes to the overall music industry funding landscape, there’s more to consider than March 2025’s YoY value spike. Combined, March 2024 and 2025 delivered 13 industry and industry-adjacent rounds, two of which came from social music app Hook. That’s less than the total behind March 2023 alone.
It’s impossible to say exactly when the IP-acquisition sector will experience a funding-announcement cooldown. Of course, billions are already earmarked for catalog purchases, plenty of players scoop up song rights without publicly revealing their raises, and there are only so many bodies of work to buy.
But when things do taper off, the situation will have a major effect on (among different areas) funding, which is still down big in 2025 as a whole. Meanwhile, though valuable, hard data doesn’t cover every funding angle; several music industry startups have ceased operating after scoring multimillion-dollar raises in recent years.
Content shared from www.digitalmusicnews.com.