Warner Music Africa meets with Nigerian government ahead of Lagos expansion

The delegation, including top executives like Warner Music president of emerging markets Alfonso Perez-Soto, WMA operations lead Laverne Thomas and WMA managing director Temi Adeniji, sought to “establish crucial relationships and to bolster WMA’s mission of empowering Nigeria’s vibrant creative sector.”

During their visit, the team met with the Minister of Art, Culture and the Creative Economy Hannatu Musawa, the Minister of State for Youth Development Ayodele Olawande and special assistant to the president on arts, culture and the creative economy Adeagbo Ayomide.

WMA reaffirmed its commitment to Nigeria’s creative sector, dating back to 2017, through investments in businesses like Ziiki Media, Chocolate City, and Africori. Warner Music Group and the Blavatnik Family Foundation Social Justice Fund had contributed over $400 000 to the industry, supporting initiatives such as West African Vocational Education and The Sarz Academy, it said.

The company has disclosed plans to build a creative hub in Lagos, allowing for the provision of more A&R, operations and marketing expertise to Nigeria’s creative ecosystem.

------ Under Adeniji and Perez-Soto’s leadership, the company has engineered global artists’ success in Africa and promoting their local repertoire worldwide, notable stories including singer CKay, whose hit single ‘Love Nwantiti’ went in the US, and Rema, whose ‘Calm Down’ remix became the first African artist-led track to cross a billion streams on Spotify last year. WMA also recently signed Nigerian singer-songwriter Joeboy, behind hits like ‘Baby’, ‘Beginning’, ‘Call’, ‘Duffel Bag’, ‘Fààjí’ and ‘Sip (Alcohol)’. ------

-- Speaking on Music Business Worldwide’s podcast recently about Warner’s strategy in sub-Saharan Africa, where recorded music revenues grew by 24.7% in 2023, fuelled by a 24.5% rise in paid streaming services according to IFPI, Adeniji said: “…In the last couple of years, we’ve covered a lot of ground via accretive investments, which have given us a really great foundation to become real players in the market.

She added: “There’s no one-size-fits-all approach, as it’s a hugely diverse region with different cultures, languages, all with really exciting local music scenes. You’ve got East Africa, you’ve got Tanzania, Kenya, you’ve got Nigeria, Ghana and West Africa, South Africa, Zimbabwe. There’s just so much richness in terms of the culture, and I think we’ve always tried to have a view of that as we’ve been moving forward, in order to build commercial plans that take into account all these idiosyncrasies.” ---