London-based ticketing startup Dice, which sells mobile tickets without booking fees and with a current focus on millennials wanting to discover new bands to see live, has closed a $6 million Series A funding round.
The round was led by Evolution Equity Partners with participation from existing investors White Star Capital, Designer Fund and Kima Ventures, along with several music industry angel investors. It also added new investor Lumia Capital for the round.
With the Series A, which closed in June but is being announced now, Dice has raised $10 million to date — topping up to its initial $1.6M in seed funding in the interim. It’s grown to 42 employees over that time, including a music and data science team focused on building machine learning algorithms to help users figure out what their next big night out should be via a shortlist of recommended gigs shown below each listed event.
Handily its investor roster includes DeepMind co-founders Mustafa Suleyman and Demis Hassabis — a connect that Dice CEO and co-founder Phil Hutcheon tells TechCrunch has been very helpful as it develops its recommendation algorithms. It’s also aiming to make its data work for promoters to help them figure out when and where to put on a gig, and even what to charge. So it’s aiming to serve both sides of the music industry: fans and artists.