Immidiate solutiuons for live music during the Covid-19 pandemic

The coronavirus pandemic caused huge uncertainty for musicians and the music ecosystem.The Next Stage Challenge online hackathon and support program aimed to find solutions that can help artists, promoters and others affected by the global lockdown to explore new experiences and business models for the covid 19 pandemic and beyond.

The Next Stage Challenge was a three-phase program, supporting innovative and sustainable projects to reshape the live music experience in the digital space.

Three key challenges were identified by individuals and organisations from Europe’s music and technology industries. The objective was to find quick but concrete solutions to support musicians and the music industry.

The three challenges were:

- Access (creation, production, broadcasting, curation)

- Fan Engagement (audience, user experience, immersives technologies)

- Value (monetization, monitoring, right management)

The remote hackathon challenge kicked off on 01 May and closed on 15 May.

The support program to accelerate the selected winning projects ran from 21 May to 10 July, 2020.

Awarded Next Stage Challenge hackathon projects​ were:

• ALISSIA SPACES From Germany
• NEMPT From Norway
• KOOATI From Sweden
• OW1 From Belgium / France
• JAMSPACE From France
• KENDRAIO From the UK

Awarded Next Stage Challenge Fast track projects

• GRAMRPHONE From the UK
• PATCH From Switzerland
• TAPPABLE From Belgium
• HYPERLIVE From Finland
• OMNILIVE From France

Find more information on the Next Stage Challenge website