Building MAIA Universe's Music Platform
Stephen Gyasi came to Rhyme with a vision for fixing music sync licensing. Here's how we built it — and why we're still building together.
Before There Was a Platform
When Stephen Gyasi first came to Rhyme, MAIA Universe was still called Freshsound. There was no codebase, no technical team, no architecture. Just a clear vision: make music licensing instant, transparent, and global.
The sync licensing industry — matching songs to films, ads, games, social content — was stuck in a world of manual negotiations, opaque pricing, and weeks-long turnaround times. Stephen saw that gap and wanted to close it with technology. He needed a team that could build the whole thing from zero.
That's our kind of project.
What We Actually Built
We didn't just write code — we made architecture decisions that the platform still runs on five years later. That's not an accident. It's what happens when you build with production experience instead of just technical enthusiasm.
The stack: Next.js + TypeScript frontend, Node.js backend, MongoDB for the flexible catalog data, AWS for infrastructure, Tailwind for the design system. Standard Rhyme toolkit, chosen for reasons that matter at scale — not because they're trendy, but because we've shipped them for other clients and know exactly where the edges are.
The hard part was the pricing engine. Every sync license quote is unique — based on project type (feature film vs. Instagram ad), distribution territory, duration, exclusivity, the artist's catalog tier. This isn't a Shopify checkout. We built a real-time calculation system that feels instant to the user while handling genuinely complex business logic underneath.
We also built the search and discovery layer — helping creators find the right track from a growing global catalog. Filtering by mood, genre, tempo, instrumentation, clearance status. Each of these sounds simple until you're handling thousands of tracks with inconsistent metadata from different labels and publishers.
The Part Nobody Talks About
Here's what we're most proud of, and it has nothing to do with code.
After the initial launch, MAIA Universe hired their own CTO. At most consultancies, that's when the relationship ends. The client "outgrows" the external team, there's an awkward transition, and everyone moves on.
At Rhyme, it was different. We welcomed it. A strong internal CTO made the whole product better, and we shifted from "primary builders" to "technical partners." Five years later, we're still there — shipping features, advising on architecture decisions, handling the work that benefits from deep context you can't build in a few months.
That transition — from build partner to long-term ally — is something we've done across multiple clients. It works because we genuinely care about the product, not just the contract. When MAIA Universe succeeds, we feel that. It's got our fingerprints all over it.
The Numbers Behind the Vision
MAIA Universe raised €1.3 million in pre-seed funding from backers including former Hipgnosis executive Shiv Prakash, Aligned Ventures, and music industry veterans from Epidemic Sound, PRMD publishing, and Royal Streaming. That caliber of backing — people who deeply understand the music industry — validates both the market opportunity and the technical execution.
The platform has grown from a Stockholm startup to an international operation. The architecture we designed in year one is handling scale we planned for but hadn't yet proven. That's the difference between building something that works today and building something that works in three years.
What This Taught Us
Every long-term client relationship teaches us something. MAIA Universe taught us that the best partnerships start before there's a product. When you're in the room for the earliest architecture decisions, you build a foundation that lasts. When you join later, you're always working around someone else's trade-offs.
It also reinforced something we already believed: Rhyme is at its best when we're building something that matters to people. Music licensing isn't the sexiest vertical on paper, but talk to any independent filmmaker or content creator who's dealt with the old way of clearing music rights, and you'll understand why this platform needed to exist.
We built the technology. Stephen and his team built the vision. Five years later, we're still building together. That's the kind of work we optimize for.