Nothing kills the vibe of a live gig more than missing out on tickets to your favourite artist, only to watch them be resold at 3 times the price a few weeks later. Or getting turned away at the door because you bought a fake ticket. It’s heartbreaking for music fans everywhere!
Enter Melbourne based start-up Tixel, a ticket resale community facilitating a simple and scalper-free service. Headed up by CEO Zac Leigh, CFO Jason Webb and CTO, Denis Mysenko, the start-up has entered the Australian market with an easy and safe facility since market testing their product at BIGSOUND’s inaugural Music Tech Showcase in 2017.
Developed to foster the booming music technology scene in Australia, BIGSOUND’s Music Tech Showcase allows emerging music tech companies with products at prototype stage to develop communication tools to assist in raising capital and to further develop or launch their product. The program gives companies a unique chance to market test their product while gaining unbiased industry feedback at BIGSOUND.
“We certainly gained good credibility through participation” said CEO and founder Zac Leigh of showcasing, “having had some successful talks and trials with other festivals and venues as a result.”
As one of the 10 companies selected to showcase at BIGSOUND 2017, and appearing under the name of Vibewire, Tixel were invited to attend a workshop with a group of industry leaders and mentors to prepare for the showcase. The exclusive workshop encourages participants to gain insights into the start-up and music industry, including how to master an initial pitch and get the necessary feedback required.
“We have a much deeper understanding of how best to articulate the benefit of our site to different industry participants,” Leigh recalls of the experience. “The process helped us recognise additional value that we can provide through our platform. From an industry point of view, this was really helpful and helped to strengthen our value proposition when meeting with potential venue and event partners”
“We developed some good mentor relationships, and are still in contact with a handful, who act as advisers”.
BIGSOUND’s B2B opportunity enabled Tixel to meet and network with prospective investors and partners at the southern hemisphere’s biggest music industry gathering. This lead to integrations with many of the major ticketing platforms, including BIGSOUND’s music festival presenting partner Oztix.
