Trebel Music

Mobile App For Free Music

Company Information

Website:

https://www.trebel.io/

Sector:

Music

Location:

Santa Monica, CA

Trebel is the world’s first music service offering downloadable music for free.

To be clear, this is not a music streaming service like Pandora or Spotify...

With Trebel, users download the songs they want to hear directly to their phone. Then they can play their music without an Internet connection — and without commercial interruption.

According to Bill Campbell, former Senior Vice President of Digital Business for Universal Music Group: “I see companies come along like this every few years: Pandora, Beats, Spotify, SoundCloud. Trebel is in their league.”

Trebel is targeting music fans aged 13 to 30. More broadly, the company is going after the 2.5 billion people globally who own cell phones, but don’t want to pay for subscription-based or downloadable music services.

The company has already achieved considerable success in the U.S., and will soon expand its services to Latin America and Southeast Asia.

Just this past week, as part of a $5 million investment round, Trebel received funding from professional venture investor Connecticut Innovations, and from Univision, one of the largest American-Spanish broadcast television networks in the world.

The idea for Trebel started back in 2005. At the time, if a person couldn’t afford to purchase music, or simply didn’t want to, they visited shady websites to download songs illegally.

These websites exposed music fans to viruses and dangerous malware, and prevented music artists from being compensated for their work.

Trebel was designed to solve these issues for both the artist and the fan. The service enables artists to be compensated for their work, while giving fans a safe, legal place to get the music they want.

Here’s how it works:

Users select songs by searching for them on the app. A preview screen appears that gives the user a chance to hear a portion of the song. If they like the song, they simply press the “Download for Free” button and the process begins.

Once songs are downloaded, they can be played whenever users want, but must be played through the app. Users can also share songs with friends using the app’s “social” feature.

This enables users to send song links to friends, and users can receive a notification whenever their friends download a new song or post a review of an album.

Trebel generates revenue through commercials and advertisements. However, unlike other music companies, Trebel doesn't play ads while music is playing. Instead, ads are played while users are searching for and downloading music.

For example, during the 30 seconds it might take a song to download, the user will hear an ad.

This approach enables Trebel to make money, while users can listen to uninterrupted music for free. The longer a user is engaged with the app, the more revenue the company can generate.

It costs the company less than 50 cents to attract each customer, while a customer’s lifetime value is between $25 and $30.

The company did an estimated $1 million in revenues in 2017.

As of July 2017, the company had 1.7 million registered users, and that number was growing by at least 100,000 each month.

Given its international expansion plans, Trebel’s goal is to have 10 million users by August 2018.

Trebel is one of the few free services to climb into the top 20 music apps in Apple’s App Store in just a few months. The service has been ranked in the top 1% of all apps in the App Store for the previous six months.

The company has secured licenses from several major music labels, including UMG, Sony, and The Orchard. These licenses enable music produced by these labels to be available on the app. Most recently, Trebel became content partners with Warner Brothers Music and Universal Music.

Company co-founder Gary Mekikian has a strong history as an entrepreneur. He previously founded Inquira, a technology company that was acquired by Oracle. And he co-founded i-Cube, a software company that went public in 1998 and, one year later, was acquired by Razorfish.

Team Background

Robert Vanech - CFO & Head of Business Development

Robert is the former Founding Chief Financial Officer and Board Member of Zealot Networks, a Los Angeles-based media company. During his tenure, Robert helped raise more than $100 million from venture capital firms.

Robert is one of the founding board members of the Los Angeles World’s Fair, a project that will bring the World’s Fair to Los Angeles in 2022.

For nearly eight years, Robert served as the Co-Founder, Treasurer, and Chief Financial Officer of railLA. This non-profit’s goal is to make a high-speed rail train between Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Robert served two years as a partner with ETF Group, a venture capital fund that invested in technology-related companies.

Robert was formerly the CEO of Cadforce, a construction engineering company. While there, Robert wrote the company’s initial business plan and was instrumental in the company’s acquisition by Neilsoft in 2009.

Robert received a degree in Finance from Boston College.

Gary Mekikian - Co-Founder & CEO

Before starting Trebel, Gary served as the CEO of Silicon Valley Technologies. This company was a start-up incubator investing in early-stage companies in the entertainment, medical device, and technology industries.

For 11 years, Gary worked as a case writing officer at Stanford University’s School of Business.

Gary is the former Founder and CEO of GATeIC Integrated Circuits, a hardware company that produced computer chips for devices including mobile headsets and smartphones.

In 1999, Gary founded Inquira, a company providing management solutions. Three years after its inception, Inquira was acquired by Oracle.

In addition, Gary formerly co-founded i-Cube, a software-based company. i-Cube went public in 1998 and, one year later, was acquired by Razorfish.

Gary formerly served as an account executive with HP.

He received a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Southern California and a Master’s degree in Management from Stanford University.

Corey Jones - Head of Product

Prior to joining Trebel, Corey worked as a finance professional with Century Park Capital Partners.

In addition, Corey worked at Edgeview Partners, a finance company that was acquired by Piper Jaffray.

Corey holds a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Duke University and an MBA from Stanford.

Scott Williamson - Chief Revenue Officer

For 14 years, Scott served as Managing Director for Threshold Interactive. This media company was acquired by Zealot Networks and is the reason Scott and Robert Vanech have worked together before Trebel.

Scott formerly served as Director of Technology for O’Grady Meyers marketing agency as well as three years at NextLeft marketing company in the same position.

Scott earned an MBA from Duke University and a Bachelor’s degree from McGill University.

Luis Soto Durazo - General Manager, International

Luis is responsible for overseeing Trebel’s presence in Mexico and, eventually, Latin America.

Prior to joining the company, Luis served as Digital Content Director for Televisa, a media company based in Mexico City, Mexico.

Luis formerly served as Digital Director for Grupo Reforma, one of Mexico’s most prestigious media publications.

Luis holds a Master’s degree in Economic Policy from Columbia University and an MBA from Stanford.

Co-Investors

Connecticut Innovations

Venture capital firm investing in companies that feature a strong management team and potential to disrupt current markets. Portfolio includes Arccos (artificial intelligence system for golf) and Kleo Pharmaceuticals.

Raising
$1.07 million
Committed
$167.749K (16%)
Current Valuation
$15 million Cap / 0% Discount
Min. Investment
$100
Deal Type
Title III
(For all investors)
Offering Type
SAFE
Finance History
  • $5 million
    2018-03-08
    Connecticut Innovations
Notable Investors
  • Connecticut Innovations
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