Amazon Music has made another key music business hire, recruiting Andre Stapleton from Sony Music as Head of US Label Relations.
In his new role, Stapleton will drive label relations account activity across Seattle, Nashville, Los Angeles, and New York, where he will be based.
Stapleton joins Amazon from Sony Music Entertainment where he has spent the last 12 years.
His most recent position at the company was SVP/Digital Partner Development, overseeing account management for Sony’s largest global digital distribution partners.
While at Sony, Stapleton worked in both London and New York offices.
He was previously the major’s Senior Vice President of Digital Business Development and Strategy, and Senior Director of International Digital Business Development.
Stapleton will now report to Ryan Redington, Director of Amazon Music.
The hire adds to a growing music team at Amazon following the launch of its premium streaming subscription tier, Amazon Music Unlimited, at the end of 2016.
At the beginning of last year, the company hired respected Big Machine Label Group exec Kelly Rich as Senior Label Relations Manager, Nashville to work directly with artists and labels in the country music genre.
In addition, Amazon is currently looking for a Head of Digital Music to launch and develop Amazon Music in Brazil and be responsible for hiring and developing a local team based in Sao Paulo.
Amazon Music has recently surpassed “tens of millions” of paying subscribers – suggesting it is now comfortably above 20m.
That 20m figure includes both its premium Music Unlimited subscribers and its Amazon Prime members, who are offered a limited-catalog platform for free.
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