Ryan Edwards’s Audoo is nearing a £100m valuation and backed by world-famous musicians - yet he’s “always had imposter syndrome as a CEO”.

A rock star turned multi-million-pound startup founder has revealed what it’s like to make a comeback in the music industry, admitting: “I’ve always had imposter syndrome as a CEO.”

After his journey to fame didn’t reach the heights he’d hoped for, Ryan Edwards returned to the music industry with a tech startup aimed at fixing the royalties data gap. Audoo, which has since gained backing from the likes of ABBA’s Björn Ulvaeus, Sir Elton John and Sir Paul McCartney, topped our MediaTech 50 ranking this year.

Speaking on the FounderMetrics podcast, hosted by Ifty Nasir, founder and CEO of share scheme platform Vestd, Edwards admitted he struggled with imposter syndrome when he became a CEO. “You’re like, right, I started a business, well I’m the CEO, and it’s a really weird thing to say. Even now, in a friendship environment, if somebody says ‘oh he’s a CEO’, I’m like ‘no no no I’m not – I just had an idea’.” Edwards recalls that during the early days of Audoo, he attended startup conferences with other founders and it felt “completely intimidating because they were privately educated or they were from a family of wealth”.

He speaks of another founder he met at one of these events who started at the same time as him and recently filed to get his business struck off. Edwards said he was “almost embarrassed” about his comparative success when they met again. “It was really weird because I was so intimidated by this guy. We are worlds apart from where we were,” he said.

Now the founder of a business nearing a £100m valuation, Ryan reveals that their first seed round of investment was the “first entry point into a mega star supporting” the business. He explained: “Just as we were closing out this round, I did an interview on BBC News because the story was starting to grow momentum – and I received this email from Björn Ulvaeus. I will never forget it. “It said: ‘Hello Ryan, my name is Björn, I saw you on the news. I’m a songwriter and I’d love to see if I can help in any way.’ “I didn’t think it could be real so the first thing I did was I texted my WhatsApp group with my best friends and asked which one of them had done this.”

Edwards and Ulvaeus soon organised a Zoom call about Audoo, which led to an investment from the ABBA star. “It’s one of those surreal moments,” Edwards recalled. “I remember dancing to Dancing Queen with my parents in the kitchen growing up.” Audoo now has a collection of mega stars backing their mission for fairer royalties, including Ulvaeus, Sir Paul McCartney and Sir Elton John. He said: “Having that backing really changed us. We’re beyond where I ever thought it would be… we’re edging towards a £100m valuation.  “I remember doing that first seed round, which we now call the series ABBA, and hitting a £16m or £17m valuation.”

Despite many acquisition offers for Audoo, Edwards said his aim is to continue growing the business. “We’re going to keep growing and keep going – we’re having the time of our lives “We get invited by our heroes to see them on stage and to go to events, we’ve really started to segment ourselves into the industry.  “The music industry is not one that particularly invites tech – we’ve probably had a really soft landing in.”