Derrick Fung

Derrick Charles Fung
Born Derrick Charles Fung
(1987-10-19) October 19, 1987
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Residence Canada
Nationality Canadian
Alma mater University of Toronto - Scarborough Campus
Occupation CEO of Tunezy

Derrick Fung (born October 19, 1987) is an entrepreneur, former investment banker and contributing writer for Forbes.[1] He is currently the CEO of Drop. He is best known as the founder and CEO of Tunezy, a music company founded in Toronto, Ontario and now based in New York City. Tunezy was acquired in 2013 by SFX Entertainment.[2] In 2014, Derrick was listed on the Forbes Top 30 under 30 list in Music.[3]

Early Life and Education

Derrick grew up in North York, Ontario, Canada. He attended York Mills Collegiate for high school. During high school, he created a site called QualitySheetMusic.com, which was the largest online sheet music community at the time with over 50,000 registered users.[4] After the site gained notoriety, he sold the website to U.S. investors in 2005.

After graduating from high school in 2005, Derrick attended the University of Toronto Scarborough where he was enrolled in the Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree.[5] He was selected to be the President of the Management and Economics Students' Association (MESA) in 2008 and was subsequently voted the Co-op Student of the Year in the same year. He was a teaching assistant for courses in Macroeconomics and Intermediate Finance. As part of the undergraduate program, he interned at Microsoft in Marketing, BNP Paribas in Equity Derivative Sales and on the trading floor of Merrill Lynch in 2009 as the first class after the merger with Bank of America. Fung was awarded the Gordon Cressy Award in 2010 for his leadership potential.[6]

In January 2010, Fung worked at the Clinton Foundation in New York City as an Intern in the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI).[7] He was one of four Canadians chosen that term to assist with the foundation. He was part of the Membership Department, which was responsible for inviting and managing the delegates for the conference.

Upon graduation from the University of Toronto, he started working at CIBC World Markets on the trading floor where he traded Foreign Exchange. He was one of the youngest employees at the bank to be given P&L responsibilities. During his time at CIBC, Fung concurrently started building Tunezy part-time with former classmate [8] and co-founder, Brandon Chu, who was in finance at Kraft Foods.[9] On Friday, April 22, 2011, one of his former bosses encouraged him to leave to work on Tunezy full-time and provided him with the initial capital to start the business.[10] Fung officially left CIBC to start Tunezy on December 22, 2011, with Brandon following suit a few months later.[11]

Tunezy

Tunezy was officially incorporated in November 2011 and operations began in January 2012, with Derrick as CEO and Brandon as Head of Product.[12] The first engineer at the company was Fung's brother, Darren Fung. The team started working in Fung's living room in Scarborough, Ontario. The initial concept of the platform was that it would become an online "Social Record Label". Tunezy quickly caught the attention of institutional investors and the company raised a seed round of financing from Intertainment Media (TSXV: INT) in early 2012.[13]

Tunezy came first at the Entrepreneurship pitch in March 2012 against 32 other companies.[14] The company shifted its vision and presented its new direction at the Billboard FutureSound Conference in San Francisco in November 2012, and was placed first in the Billboard Innovators Showcase.[15] In October 2013, it was announced that Tunezy would be acquired by SFX Entertainment.[16] The Tunezy platform was rolled into SFX Entertainment after the acquisition. Fung was made a senior member of the Global Business Development team at SFX Entertainment where he focused on the festival Tomorrowland.[17] Fung was the youngest Vice President at the company at age 26. He is a frequent speaker at music conferences including Canadian Music Week, MIDEM, NXNE, SXSW, and Billboard. He has also made television appearances on numerous Canadian TV shows and networks including BNN, CityTV, and Global News. Fung was a co-chair for Canadian Music Week in 2015.[18]

Awards and Notables

References

  1. ↑ "How A Business Is Like An Airplane". Forbes.
  2. ↑ "SFX Beefing Up Digital Capabilities, Plans to Buy Tunezy, Fame House and Arc90". Billboard.
  3. ↑ "2014 30 under 30: Music". Forbes.
  4. ↑ "Get to know a Toronto startup: Tunezy". BlogTO.
  5. ↑ "Management student selected for prestigious New York internship".
  6. ↑ "2010 Gordon Cressy Student Leadership Awards Ceremony". University of Toronto.
  7. ↑ "From Big Man on Campus to the Big Apple".
  8. ↑ "Tunezy the Social Record Label Debuts with Beta Test".
  9. ↑ "Toronto Startup: Tunezy A CrowdFunded Record Label Of Sorts INTERVIEW".
  10. ↑ "Cash from former boss helps launch music company". The Globe & Mail. May 23, 2013.
  11. ↑ "Tunezy the Social Record Label Debuts with Beta Test".
  12. ↑ "Tunezy's New Fan Wishlists Connect Musicians And Fans Through Tangible Experiences".
  13. ↑ "Intertainment Media Announces Investment in Independent Music Platform Tunezy, Inc.". Bloomberg.
  14. ↑ National Business & Technology Conference (NBTC)
  15. ↑ "Tunezy Wins Billboard's FutureSound Innovators Showcase". Billboard. November 17, 2012.
  16. ↑ "SFX Beefing Up Digital Capabilities, Plans to Buy Tunezy, Fame House and Arc90". Billboard.
  17. ↑ LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/derrickfung. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  18. ↑ "Co-Chair Committee Announced for CMW 2015".
  19. ↑ "Forbes Top 30 Under 30 - Music". Forbes.
  20. ↑ "Profile: Derrick Fung, 2012 FuEL Award Winner". Profit Magazine.
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