Continuing our series of interviews with companies in the Silicon Roundabout area of London (we’re calling this The Roundabout Tapes), we went to interview Mixcloud.
The on-demand radio service wants to be the ‘YouTube of radio’. Online radio is very much a digital media orphan; languishing in a fragmented space while innovations in other aspects of streaming media have come thick and fast over the last few years.
Anyone can upload to the site and the listeners decide who gets exposed. Of course, it has social tools built in, so users can share and discover radio through friends. There’s also a radio recommendation algorithm to help users find shows they love.
The startup was founded by Nikhil Shah and Nico Perez, who met when they studied at Cambridge University (maths and engineering, respectively). Both of them were radio presenters and DJs and frustrated by how hard it was discovering and promoting radio online.
More than 50,000 content creators use the site now. The site currently lean towards club music and DJs.
