Godwin Tom, Nigerian talent manager, says it makes no sense that no university in Africa is offering music business as a programme despite its inherent potentials.
The entrepreneur was speaking on events that led to the establishment of Music Business Academy (MBA) for Africa at the YouTube Music press meeting on Tuesday.
Tom said he was motivated to put up the initiative after discovering that several people in Africa lack a basic understanding of how the music industry works.
The music executive also recalled how he was trying to employ people who would work for him years back but could not get one with vast knowledge about the music industry.
According to him, the African music market has an estimated 1.7 billion people with a median age of 19.7.
Tom said with such potentials, learning the business side of the music industry is imperative, hence his decision to establish MBA to groom young people.
“It makes no sense to me that we have about 1,200 varsities in Africa and none of them is offering music business as a course in a market where there are about 1.4 to 1.7 billion people and the median age is 19.7,” he said.
“That’s why we decided to come in. We are ensuring that we put together global professionals and people with African perspectives to come in and teach the students.”
On services offered by MBA, he said: “What we have done is to set up a programme in two major phases. The first phase is actual teaching where we teach the students about copyright, the industry, among others.
“After the teaching, the students are then divided into departments and asked come up with a record label where they will work directly with artistes as well as writers from scratch to develop an album that they would market.”
Tom has worked with several heavyweights in Nigeria’s entertainment landscape including MI Abaga, Wizkid, Davido, Wande Coal, Ice Prince, Jesse Jagz, Show Dem Camp, Waje, Rooftop Mcs, Bez and Beverly Naya.
In an interview with us, the talent manager had talked about his quest to see music business in the curricula of universities across Nigeria with the aim of grooming future music executives.
He also spoke about the idea behind his Music Business Africa (MBA) programme.
