Tonada raises €2.6M pre-seed to design how brands sound
What's the deal? Stockholm-based TonadaDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has raised €2.6 million ($3 million) in a pre-seed round to build what it calls an operating system for how physical spaces sound. The platform uses AI to generate original, royalty-free music tailored to a brand's identity, streamed across locations and adapted in real time.
AntlerDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → led the round, with Spintop VenturesDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, RTP Global, Triple A VC, and Karaoke ClubDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → participating. Angel investors include Vercel founder Guillermo RauchDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, a16z scout Dora Palfi Osika, Ingrid Bojner, and Mattias MikscheDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →.
Founded in 2025 by Juan Manuel Serruya, formerly an engineering lead at Spotify, and Jonathan Andersson, formerly head of sales at Wolt, Tonada is already live with paying customers across restaurants, hotels, retail, wellness, and co-working spaces in Scandinavia, DACH, and Singapore.
Why now? Most brands invest millions in visual identity but default to a licensed playlist someone picked once and set to shuffle. Tonada argues this is a massive missed opportunity. HUI Research tracked 1.8 million transactions and found that brand-matched music increased sales by 9.1% compared with random popular music — while random popular hits performed 4.3% worse than no music at all.
There's also a compliance angle: many small businesses play unlicensed music, risking hefty fines from licensing organisations. Tonada says its tracks are fully original and owned by the company, so a customer's subscription covers everything — no separate rights holders or collection societies involved.
What could go wrong? AI-generated music is still a contested space. Questions around quality, listener fatigue, and whether algorithmically produced soundscapes can truly match the emotional depth of human-composed music remain open. Regulatory frameworks for AI-generated content are also evolving, which could introduce new licensing or labelling requirements.
Competition is another factor. Existing business music services like Soundtrack Your Brand already serve physical spaces, and larger AI music companies could move into the B2B segment.
The signal: Tonada sits at the intersection of two trends: the rapid maturation of generative AI for audio and the growing recognition that in-store experience drives revenue. As e-commerce forces physical retail to justify its existence, every sensory detail — including sound — becomes a competitive lever. Antler's lead at the earliest stage, alongside growth-focused funds like RTP Global and Spintop Ventures, signals conviction that AI-generated audio for physical spaces can scale fast — and that a single generative platform might replace fragmented music-licensing markets worldwide.
"Tonada is one of those cases that builds both a better product for their brand clients and a superior experience for the end consumers," said Tobias Bengtsdahl, general partner at Antler. "They're building real infrastructure in a category with real-world impact that has been overlooked far too long."
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