A Conversation with Snoop Dogg and Larry Jackson | Milken Institute Global Conference 2023

Gamma Structure and Leadership

• Larry Jackson founded Gamma, an enterprise software and service company bridging artistic vision with business execution, distinct from a traditional label or management firm.
• Gamma is co-chaired by Jackson and Snoop Dogg, who acquired Death Row Records and serves as its CEO, with Eldridge and Apple listed as key capital partners.
• Gamma recently appointed Saipu Delamini (former UMG CEO for Sub-Saharan Africa) as President of Africa and the Middle East, with Naomi Campbell named as a special advisor for the same region.
• The company's distribution arm, Gamma Distribution (formerly Vidya), reports a 5 billion monthly stream volume across platforms and is recognized as the fastest-growing distribution service globally.

Payment Technology and Artist Economics

• Gamma utilizes a proprietary financial dashboard to pay artists monthly, with select high-volume cases paid weekly, contrasting sharply with traditional industry biannual or biennial payout cycles.
• Jackson highlights that 80% year-over-year growth was achieved at key DSPs in Gamma's first seven weeks of operation.
• Jackson and Dogg express severe frustration regarding YouTube Shorts, noting that 500 million of Gamma's monthly streams generated only $16,000 in revenue despite Alphabet's stated growth goals for the platform.
• The panel criticizes the current streaming royalty model for failing to correlate massive stream counts with proportional artist income, citing a lack of transparency comparable to historical physical sales tracking.

Business Decisions and Releases

• Gamma released a limited 420 collaboration of 420 vinyl collector's editions with Snoop Dogg; the initial drop sold out on Gamma's D2C site in under 30 seconds, with the company honoring fan requests to cease further sales to maintain exclusivity.
• Snoop Dogg announced a 30th-anniversary orchestral performance of the Doggystyle album at the Hollywood Bowl in June, produced by Dr. Dre with a 60-piece LA Phil orchestra.
• Gamma is producing two new film projects: a football movie titled Underdogs with MGM and Amazon (releasing in fall) and a biopic of Snoop Dogg's life with Universal Pictures.

Industry Trends and Strategic Outlook

• Gamma operates on a "quality over quantity" strategy, currently distributing a curated roster of approximately 15,000 invite-only artists, rejecting the industry standard of aggregating millions of artists with low engagement.
• Data indicates that only 57,000 of the 11 million artists on Spotify earn over $10,000 annually, reinforcing Gamma's pivot toward sustainable, high-value artist partnerships.
• Jackson anticipates leveraging AI for predictive financial modeling and dashboard analytics to provide artists with hourly revenue insights not available through standard DSPs.
• Global music consumption is dominated by streaming, representing 84% of the US market, 67% globally, and 95.5% in Africa, driving Gamma's aggressive expansion in international territories.
• Gamma successfully shortened the vinyl manufacturing timeline to under two months, outpacing major labels which typically require a five-to-six-month pipeline from test pressing to retail.