Music’s M&A space just witnessed another major transaction – involving some familiar names.
HarbourView Equity Partners, led by former Tempo Music CEO Sherrese Clarke Soares, has secured approximately $500 million in debt financing through a private securitization backed by its catalog of music royalties. (In other words, the repackaging of royalty income into bonds.)
Arguably the even bigger news today is who led that debt financing: investment giant KKR.
Investment accounts advised by Kuvare Asset Management also participated in the transaction, according to an announcement on Wednesday (March 13).
KKR’s involvement in the debt financing arrives just a few weeks after the investment firm sold its majority stake in Chord Music Partners, the platform it established with Dundee Partners.
Universal Music Group bought a minority (25.8%) interest in Chord for USD $240 million. Dundee Partners, the investment office of the Hendel family, owns the other 74.2%. The deal valued Chord at USD $1.85 billion.
KKR is providing the financing to HarbourView as part of its Asset-Based Finance (ABF) strategy, which, it says, “focuses on privately originated and negotiated credit investments that are backed by large and diversified pools of financial and hard assets, offering diversification to traditional corporate credit and attractive risk-adjusted returns”.
KKR’s ABF platform began investing in 2016 and now has approximately $48 billion in ABF assets under management globally across its “High-Grade ABF and Opportunistic ABF strategies”.
“Music IP is one of many areas where we see opportunity and we are pleased to finance a scaled and high-quality portfolio in this space.”
Avi Korn and Chris Mellia, KKR
Avi Korn and Chris Mellia, Co-Heads of U.S. Asset-Based Finance at KKR, said on Wednesday that this transaction “is a testament to the scale and versatility of our High-Grade Asset-Based Finance strategy, which is a fast-growing segment of our private credit business”.
They added: “Music IP is one of many areas where we see opportunity and we are pleased to finance a scaled and high-quality portfolio in this space.”
Guggenheim Securities, LLC served as sole structuring advisor, and Guggenheim Securities, LLC and Barclays acted as co-placement agents, on the new HarbourView financing transaction.
The financing follows Harbour Views’s $300 million credit facility expansion announced in December 2023.
Established in 2021 with backing from Apollo Global Management, HarbourView Equity Partners reports to have since amassed roughly $1.6 billion in “regulatory managed assets”.
The company has acquired over 50 catalogs to date.
Some of the firm’s recent deals include Christine McVie’s share of Fleetwood Mac’s recorded music royalties from the late artist’s estate and a share of “select” recorded music and publishing assets from Grammy Award-winning artists Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo.
HarbourView’s catalog features over 28,100 songs across both master recordings and publishing income streams.
“This capital will allow us to further our mission of investing in assets and companies driven by premier intellectual property while striving to ensure that creators are appropriately valued for their contributions to the world.”
Sherrese Clarke Soares, HarbourView
“We are grateful to KKR for working with us to deliver a flexible and innovative financing structure that will support HarbourView in expanding its reach,” said HarbourView Founder and CEO Sherrese Clarke Soares.
“This capital will allow us to further our mission of investing in assets and companies driven by premier intellectual property while striving to ensure that creators are appropriately valued for their contributions to the world.”
HarbourView has also amassed a catalog of music rights in the hip-hop space, striking a deal in July for the “select recorded music and publishing assets” of Wiz Khalifa.
HarbourView also acquired “select recorded music assets” of Grammy Award-winning rapper, Nelly.
The firm has also acquired publishing catalogs from country music artists Lady A and Brad Paisley, as well as the publishing catalog of Latin music superstar Luis Fonsi.
Eleswhere, the company secured Big Loud Mountain Music’s publisher share of select songs from the catalog of country music duo Florida Georgia Line and the music publishing catalog of Incubus.
HarbourView also acquired the catalog of SoundHouse Acquisitions LLC in 2022 for a reported $325 million.Music Business Worldwide
