It was only a month ago when music streaming service SoundCloud announced that it would be laying off a little over 40 percent of its staff. At the time, co-founder and CEO Alex Ljung stated that it was required in order to "ensure our path to long-term, independent success." Unfortunately, what the public would find out later is that the layoffs would only give the firm enough money to survive until Q4.
Today, Ljung made a statement through the firm's blog announcing that The Raine Group and Temasek have just sealed the deal on the largest financing round in the history of the company. This means that, for the time being, SoundCloud will stick around and will remain an independent company.
Along with the new investment, Ljung will step out of the role of CEO which will go to Kerry Trainor, who is best known for his time at Vimeo as CEO. The firm will also add Mike Weissman to the team who will become the firm's COO. Although Ljung has been the CEO and chairman of the company for nearly a decade, the founder will now simply just oversee the company as a chairman.
With this new round of financing and a shake up at the top, it will be interesting to see how SoundCloud will reinvigorate itself and keep things in the green.
Source: SoundCloud via TechCrunch
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