Some 13 years ago (from a DJ perspective), Serato unleashed Scratch Live on an unsuspecting world. And since then, Serato has changed the industry, and been changed by the industry too. But one thing has remained consistent, and that’s the owners. Steve West and AJ Bertenshaw were the guys who had the idea for Serato via their Pitch ‘n Time algorithm, and along with their parents made up the shareholders.
But it seems that their parents have reached an age where they’d like to step away from business and retire, perhaps to play with all the DJ gear that their investment has helped build. And as you can imagine, 40% of one of the world’s biggest players in the DJ industry isn’t exactly pocket change. Thus Steve and AJ are looking for expressions of interest, in layman’s terms asking people if they would like a large but minority slice of that Serato pie.
Here’s the press release:
Serato opens up for investment / Serato minority shareholders possible exit
Serato, a world leader in music software, is exploring options for minority stake investment.
Young Ly, Serato CEO said: “ The business has never been better. It is the most used professional DJ software product globally, continues to lead the industry, and we have many exciting announcements still to come.
However, two minority shareholders, who are the parents of the founders Steve West and AJ Bertenshaw, are now at retirement age. So having helped fund Serato in its early days, they are now looking at options around their possible exit.”
The process started on the 12th of September with the business contacting suitable parties looking for expressions of interest. Otherwise, it’s business as usual for the software company having just launched the extremely well received Dj-808, and gearing up for another update to it’s hugely popular Serato DJ product.
What happens next?
There’s a fairly detailed process of first offers, then due diligence, and a final offer from those whose intentions and pockets match up with Serato’s goals and aims. The whole process should be wrapped up by the end of the year.
Having a minority share, it’s highly likely that there will be no tangible difference to our public perception of Serato at all. But I’m imagining what could happen if a potential investor smashes a good number of piggy banks and digs down the back of all their sofas and comes up with a number that turns Serato’s heads enough to let a majority share or even the whole thing go. Now that’s a popcorn moment.
Sounds like a great opportunity for INMUSIC.
Then we will have to #fixseratodj some more, if inmusic gets involved. LOL..
Then we’ll need a new hashtag: #fixinmusic haha!
Just saw this one!!! hahaha!
Absolutely! InMusic will snatch this up by the end of the week they own Rane,Denon,Numark and Akai and they all use Serato. Chance are they have already made that deal Serato is just easing the the shock by tendering it in the open. Now if Mark just spills the beans on what he saw at Denon wink wink!
Spill the beans already @Mark Settle lol ;-).
No, no. Just… no. We don’t need more monopolising in the industry.
But that’s the environment we’re in now in the DJ industry. It’s amazingly difficult for smaller companies that don’t enjoy the buying power of someone like InMusic or Pioneer to get a product manufactured (unless you don’t care about quality). You have to believe that JOD has had his eye on Serato for a long time, and I’m wondering if all of the staffing turmoil that’s happened there over the last year or so doesn’t have something to do with company re-organization (either to be in a better position to buy a company like Serato, or in preparation for an IPO).
In any case, while it’s possible that Serato might get gobbled up by some private equity firm, I’m betting a bigger player in MI winds up with them. Can you imagine if it was a retailer that bought them instead of a manufacturer? Imagine if GC bought a minority stake for instance. It would give them incredible insight into DJ that would most certainly increase their sales. Just a thought…
Serato is on stage for their 2017 audition right now… this is the time where they really need to play their cards right. Pioneer shook the scene up with a 2 channel mixer during times when controllers and 4 channel options had everyone’s focus… no one thought a 2 channel “scratch” mixer would become such a hot item so fast…. Pair a hardware company (pioneer) with a piece of hardware that goes vital like that, and Serato is now in competition with someone in the software “industry standard game” overnight.
The next 730 days will be interesting for sure.
I’m rooting for them, even though i’m running their favorite Serato FB group ;)
Wonder how much 40% is worth…
“another update to it’s hugely popular Serato DJ product.”
I’m Italian, but how can you issue a press release with a grammar error like this?
I think they misplaced a couple commas earlier in the sentence but the section in your example is proper english afaict