Former RTÉ journalist Mark Little and Áine Kerr, former Irish Independent political reporter, have sold their media startup, Kinzen, to music streaming service Spotify.
culminating at the Irish IndependentMr Little declined to disclose the value of the deal, which he described as “brilliant”.
Under the terms of the acquisition, co-founders Mr Little and Ms Kerr will become executives of Spotify, which will maintain the Kinzen office and its 22-person staff as an internal Dublin-based unit.
“It is recognition that Dublin is increasingly becoming the global hub for online safety,” Mr Little said.
“I think it was actually a lot easier for Spotify to see a Dublin-based company in trust and security as a natural fit.
“I think that says a lot about the centrality of Dublin and Ireland in the ongoing effort to create more online safety.”
Spotify said Kinzen’s technology and expertise will help it more effectively deliver a “safe and enjoyable experience” on their platform worldwide.
The music streamer faced a massive backlash earlier this year when rock legend Neil Young pulled his extensive back catalog from the platform to protest what he called the misinformation being spread by the biggest Spotify podcaster Joe Rogan.
During the Covid pandemic, Kinzen was hired by the Department of Health to monitor and advise on the spread of misinformation about the pandemic and efforts to curb it.
Mr Little said Kinzen mixes cutting-edge technology with being “the human in the loop” for the online trust and security issues faced by large platforms.
“It is the recognition that Dublin is increasingly becoming the hub of online safety in the world”
“We have a growing engineering and product team that has built really advanced technology to analyze content – especially podcasts and audio,” he said.
“We have a network of people, including experts in 26 languages, who cover just about every continent in the world. And we’ve built proprietary technology that allows analysts to look at large amounts of audio content and pick out much more precisely what we need to look at.
Mark Little was a senior on-air journalist at RTÉ for two decades before embarking on the creation of Storyful – a media company that verified material shared on social media platforms. In 2013, he sold the company to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp for 18 million euros.
He was also the head of Twitter’s Irish office for a brief period.
Áine Kerr was a senior member of the Storyful team and the two launched Kinzen together in 2017, initially aiming to provide customers with personalized news feeds from multiple publishers.
The company then focused on the developing field of monitoring and countering online disinformation.
Spotify said the Irish company’s unique technology is particularly suited to podcasting and audio formats, “making its value to Spotify clear and unmatched”.
“We have a long and impactful and collaborative partnership with Kinzen and his exceptional team,” said Dustee Jenkins, Global Head of Public Affairs, Spotify.
“Now, by working together, we can further improve our ability to detect and address harmful content, in a way that better takes local context into account.
“This investment expands Spotify’s approach to platform security – and underscores how seriously we take our commitment to creating a safe and enjoyable experience for creators and users alike.”
Kinzen has worked with Spotify since 2020, initially focusing on the integrity of election-related content and later on misinformation, disinformation and hate speech.
Although financial details of the acquisition have not been disclosed, Kinzen’s early investors include Mr Little, Dublin-based entrepreneur Ray Nolan and Derianto Kusuma, the booking company’s co-founder and chief technology officer. of Indonesian Traveloka flights.
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