Panos Panay

Career

Panay began his career as talent agent at Ted Kurland Associates responsible for the international tours of artists like Chick Corea, Pat Metheny and other world renown jazz artists.

In 2000, after years at Ted Kurland Associates, he was inspired to start the company Sonicbids as of way of enabling independent artists to easily connect with music promoters online and pioneered the use of Electronic Press Kits (EPK) as a means of booking bands. Panay founded the company in his apartment in Newton, MA. As the founder of Sonicbids, he created the leading platform for bands to book gigs and market themselves online, building a subscriber network of 550,000 bands and 35,000 promoters from over 100 countries with an estimated 1,200,000 gigs having been booked through the platform. Panay led the company as CEO for 13 years, from its inception until after its successful acquisition by Backstage LLC, in a deal backed by Guggenheim Partners.

He is widely credited for spotting and capitalizing early on three distinct emerging trends in the music business over the last decade: the shift to a primarily online means of marketing; the emergence of an “artistic middle class”; and the shift from a record-label funded industry to a consumer /brand-funded music business.

In 2013, after the sale of Sonicbids, Panay joined his alma mater Berklee college to found the Berklee Institute for Creative Entrepreneurship (BerkleeICE) which has a mission of fostering the entrepreneurial mindset of the Berklee community and preparing students for careers in music. Among the institute’s many activities are joint classes with MIT and the design firm IDEO, a summer high school program in collaboration with Brown University, sponsored internships, research projects such as Rethink Music’s Fair Music Report, online courses and other engagements meant to get students ready for careers.

In June 2016, Panay co-founded the non-profit Open Music Initiative, in collaboration with the MIT Media Lab, a number of other individuals including inventor Dan Harple and IDEO partner Michael Hendrix, as well as various music industry entities. Its mission is to promote and advance the development of open source standards and innovation related to music to help assure proper compensation for all creators, performers and rights holders of music. The initiative launched with more than 60 companies involved including: Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, BMG, Spotify, YouTube, Pandora, SoundCloud, Netflix, Harry Fox Agency, SiriusXM as well as a number of rights related blockchain startups.

Writing & Speaking

Panay writes about startups and entrepreneurship for blogs and publications such as Huffington Post, Forbes, Entrepreneir, WSJ Accelerators and Fast Company; guest lectures at universities including MIT Engineering, Harvard University, Boston University, Brown University, and Bentley College; and is a frequent speaker at events worldwide including SXSW, Midem, and TEDx.

Awards & Honors

He has been awarded the Fast Company’s “Fast 50″ honor; Inc. Magazine’s “Inc. 500”; Mass Hi-Tech All Stars; Berklee College’s Distinguished Alumnus Award; Boston Business Journal’s “40 under 40” and BosInno “50 on Fire” Award for excellence in education.

Education

Panay holds a Music Business & Management degree from Berklee College of Music.

Personal life

Panay resides with his wife and identical twin daughters in Watertown, MA. He is a longtime supporter of Arsenal Football Club.