Melissa Kariuki joins the GRAMMYs: A win for African tech, music, and girls in management

Kenyan entrepreneur Melissa Kariuki, founding father of music-tech firm Whip Music, has been chosen to affix the Recording Academy’s 2025 New Member Class — formally giving Kenya and Africa a stronger voice inside the GRAMMYs voting physique and world music business.

The Recording Academy is the world’s main society of music professionals and the group behind the GRAMMY Awards—music’s solely peer-recognized accolade and highest achievement. As a brand new member, Kariuki joins a world neighborhood of creators and professionals who maintain a voice within the GRAMMY Awards course of and a platform to advocate for the music business and its future.

This 12 months’s invitation was prolonged to just about 3,600 established music professionals throughout numerous backgrounds, genres, and disciplines—underscoring the Academy’s dedication to inclusive illustration. The 2025 New Member Class is 49% ladies, 56% individuals of shade, and 60% underneath the age of 40. Kariuki represents all three.

Her inclusion is each a private milestone and a symbolic shift: a mirrored image of the rising affect of African founders, ladies in tech, and new voices shaping the way forward for music—on and off the stage.

Melissa’s background is in product advertising and progress, having labored at each Google and Meta. As we speak, she brings that very same tech-forward considering into the music business—making use of knowledge, automation, and AI to assist artists develop their world attain and fanbases.

“Once I was in college, I might arrange open mics, trend exhibits, and artwork festivals,” Kariuki shared. “I used to be pushed by ardour and curiosity. I by no means would have imagined that it might lead me to beginning a music firm.”

Via her firm Whip Music, she has run over 200 campaigns throughout nations together with Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and the USA—advertising music for world stars equivalent to David Guetta, CKay, Ayra Starr, Fave, and The Cavemen.

“This can be a milestone in my music journey,” she added. “I’ve been fortunate sufficient to work with artists all all over the world and get their music heard in new markets. As we speak, I’m celebrating a second that university-me couldn’t have imagined—being invited to the Recording Academy. I believe a few of life’s finest items are found once you’re already on the journey. That is a type of items.”

In 2023, Whip Music grew to become the primary music-tech firm accepted into the Google for Startups Africa Accelerator. The corporate has additionally pushed a number of strategic partnerships throughout the continent, most notably with Boomplay, Africa’s largest streaming platform with over 100 million customers.

Whip was created to present all African artists—particularly these simply beginning out—a good probability to get their music heard. Recognizing how troublesome it may be for even essentially the most gifted artists to interrupt into the business, the corporate constructed a market for music providers. Artists of all backgrounds can entry inexpensive promotional instruments to develop actual audiences and acquire visibility in a crowded panorama.

With over 100,000 new songs uploaded to Spotify day by day, standing out has by no means been more durable. Whip is utilizing expertise to make music promotion extra accessible, data-driven, and efficient—giving artists the instruments they should compete on a world stage.

As a member of the Recording Academy, Kariuki joins a rising community of creators and innovators. These members usually are not solely shaping GRAMMY outcomes but in addition collaborating in initiatives that advance fairness, champion creators’ rights, and affect the way forward for music throughout borders.

About Melissa Kariuki 

Melissa Kariuki is the founder and CEO of Whip Music, a music-tech startup on a mission to leverage expertise to unlock creators’ subsequent one billion followers. She has labored in product at Google and Meta, and brings expertise throughout Asia, Europe, the U.S., and Africa at organizations together with Bain & Firm, H&M, the Gates Foundation, and INSEAD.

Melissa holds a First Class Honours diploma from the African Management College in Mauritius. She earned her Grasp of Administration Science in International Affairs as a Patrice Motsepe Fellow and Schwarzman Scholar at Tsinghua College in Beijing, the place she obtained a 99% distinction for her thesis on Blockchain, NFTs, and Web3 adoption and regulation.

About Whip Music 

Whip Music is a music-tech firm on a mission to assist artists unlock their subsequent one billion followers.The platform leverages expertise to present artists entry to a variety of providers, together with music and video distribution, editorial playlisting, TV placements, radio, press, influencer advertising, social media promoting, and extra. Whether or not an artist has zero followers or a million, Whip helps them develop and monetise an engaged fanbase.

For extra details about the Whip Music, Please go to whipservices.com or contact us at [email protected].

Concerning the Recording Academy 

The Recording Academy represents the voices of performers, songwriters, producers, engineers, and all music professionals. Devoted to making sure the recording arts stay a thriving a part of our cultural heritage, the Academy helps music creators by the GRAMMY Museum®, MusiCares®, and the GRAMMY Awards®—music’s solely peer-recognized accolade and highest achievement.

For extra data, go to grammy.com and recordingacademy.com.