In an increasingly digital world, creators have a variety of tools to work with partners across the globe. Think Google Docs, DropBox, "the cloud" — you name it.
But what if you're a musician? What options do you have to enable digital music collaboration?
If Larry Mickie has anything to say about it, there's Kanari.
Pronounced like the songbird, the Charlotte-born startup serves as a one-stop (music collaboration) shop "where audio professionals and their teams work together to get creative projects completed," according to its website.
"If everybody leaves, who’s going to be the person to do it here?"
With Kanari, users can share, sync and secure music files, get feedback on different pieces and organize their projects.
"Let's say me and Courtney are working on a product together. If I'm hanging out in China [and she's Stateside], anything I drop into my Kanari folder, Courtney can access; everything we do can be in sync," Mickie explained.
Users access these tools with one fee, which is scaled depending on the size of the customer's enterprise. For example, a single songwriter's membership is around $10 per month, while a team of five would pay a $49.99 price tag.
"I want to put emphasis on the fact [that we're focused] on the music workflow," Mickie said. "We’re not going to have a general focus on being a tool for everyone. We want to focus on the music maker."
His life-long background as just that — a musician, songwriter and producer — has informed his entrepreneurial pursuits.
"I was already songwriter; I was big into art," Mickie explained. "I already loved products … [Startup development] was another form of it. The web design and the layout ... it's the same thing as songwriting or sketching. I was already doing that stuff, but I didn’t know it, as [I wasn't yet] in the tech and product world."
In fact, Kanari isn't Mickie's first startup. MusicLinx, a music software company, boasts 65,000 users and is still growing. (Mickie said there's a chance it could be grandfathered into the Kanari platform.)
As for this venture, the impetus was pretty simple: Mickie was looking for an app to connect him to other musicians. There wasn't one.
The wheels started turning for him. "You know how a song can make an impact? How can I make a product that changes someone's life as well?" he had asked himself.
It wasn't until a college friend brought Mickie down to Charlotte and he met a software mentor that he started developing Kanari.
But why Charlotte for a music startup? Why not Los Angeles or Nashville, or even Atlanta?
Mickie said location is a current hot topic for his team of three.
"Do we stay here and do it here, knowing it's going to be really hard? Or do we go to Atlanta or Nashville? We've been leaning toward the latter. That's where the meat and potatoes are. Why not go there?"
The issue, however, is far from settled.
"One of the people we look up to is Garret Tichy, [the founder of Hygge Coworking]," Mickie continued. "[He told us], 'If everybody leaves, who’s going to be the person to do it here?'"
Mickie agreed that it's a fair question. After all, he's a self-avowed lover of challenges, and even though developing a music startup Charlotte represents one, he argued that the city's music scene is burgeoning.
While the Kanari team mulls over its future HQ, it's still working on a number of different goals. The entity is currently bootstrapped, which is the result of having a billable product.
"We want to keep [financials] in-house until we need it," Mickie said.
The company hopes to complete its current alpha testing and move through a beta phase toward an official public launch soon, too. And there's the matter of growing the team.
Whatever's next, Mickie knows it's all just a part of his "typical entrepreneurial journey," he said. "You might make the wrong hire ... you might have a setback on your product … you might have a lot of crazy things happen, but it’s part of the journey."
