Photo Credit: Triller
Five weeks back, Timbaland and Swizz Beatz sued Triller over millions in allegedly owed payments stemming from the acquisition of their Verzuz music-competition program. Now, the artists and the video-sharing app have settled.
In their firmly worded complaint against Triller – which bought Verzuz back in March of 2021 – Timbaland and Swizz Beatz argued that the TikTok rival had defaulted on north of $28 million worth of agreed-upon payments stemming from the buyout.
Triller, which is pursuing an IPO after shelving a planned SPAC merger, quickly refuted the action’s claims, maintaining in part that “no one has benefited as much from Triller to-date” as Swizz Beatz and Timbaland.
But as mentioned at the outset, the parties have put their multimillion-dollar dispute to rest a little over one month following the lawsuit’s introduction.
Though the settlement agreement’s precise terms haven’t been publicly announced, the deal presumably centers on Triller making additional payments to the Beatclub founder Timbaland and Swizz Beatz (who’s promptly resumed plugging Verzuz on his social media accounts). Of course, late August saw Triller reveal that it had closed a “substantial” funding round ahead of its public listing.
In any event, each of the involved parties addressed the matter in public statements, including joint remarks from Timbaland and Swizz Beatz.
“VERZUZ has always been a platform that is by the artists, for the artists, and with the people,” Swizz Beatz and Timbaland said. “We’re glad to come to an amicable agreement with Triller and continue giving fans the music and community that they’ve come to know and love from the brand.”
Meanwhile, Triller co-founder and executive chairman Bobby Sarnevesht added in a statement of his own: “VERZUZ and Triller will always be a safe place and outlet for creators and their art. Nothing will change that. Creators started this and will continue building it. This is a victorious moment in the Triller and VERZUZ relationship as we march together toward the public markets. Stay tuned.”
Regarding this march toward the public markets, execs (upon detailing the aforesaid funding round) doubled down on their plans to spearhead a direct listing in early Q4 2022.
So long as “the capital markets continue to be stable,” the company is poised to list shares on NASDAQ under the ticker “ILLR,” higher-ups made clear. Separately, Sony Music sued Triller for alleged copyright infringement last month, and towards September’s beginning, it came to light that the short-form platform was facing a different complaint yet, this time from an app services partner.