Downtown Music Taps Curve Founder Tom Allen to Lead New Royalties and Financial Services Division

Downtown Music has launched a new royalties and financial services division called DR&FS, which will streamline all of its royalty services, accounting and payments systems, the company announced Tuesday (May 14).

The division is an outgrowth of Curve Royalty Systems, a royalty processing platform acquired by Downtown in January 2023. Curve’s founder, Tom Allen, has been appointed president of Downtown Royalties & Financial Services and will report directly to Downtown chief business officer David Driessen, the company said.

Through Curve, DR&FS already supports more than a thousand labels and publishers globally, including Big Machine, Mad Decent, Epitaph, Domino and others. Leading the Curve unit on a day-to-day basis will be Richard Leach, who has been elevated from general manager to managing director and will report directly to Allen. 

Allen said the goal of the expanded financial services division is to ensure “every stream is accounted for” across more than 5,000 business clients and 4 million artist relations. DR&FS provides real-time access to statement balances and detailed analytics data broken down by territory, usage type and income source.

“Downtown Royalties and Financial Services is both a commitment to the expansion of our core offering into deeper services and solving payment problems to our customers, and to simplifying the financial complexities that artists and businesses across the industry face daily,” said Driessen. “Tom’s leadership at Curve has already elevated the industry standard for royalty management and financial services. His expertise will be crucial as he guides this new division at Downtown.”