THE ROAD TO iTO
Nikolai and Gisle founded iTO in 2020 to build a next-generation music platform that removes creative barriers and unlocks new user experiences. We're aming to create a new standard for interactive music creation.
Both product and technology have been tested at several prestigious universities in the USA during the four years we have spent on development.
"iTO is THE ideal music education tool that I wish I had all these years teaching music!"
Pofessor Gena Greher
Chair of Dept. of Music,
University of Massachusetts,
USA
THE HISTORY OF iTO
A Journey of Music, Creativity, Collaboration, and Innovation.
Gisle presenting the precursor to iTO in Mexico City, together with the former Norwegian prime minister Erna Solberg.
"The journey toward iTO has been long, but incredibly inspiring. It all began in the late 1990s. With a background as both a musician and music teacher, I co-founded my first company in 1995—a music festival in Bergen that grew into Norway’s largest concert promotor company. Twenty-five years later, it was acquired by Live Nation, the world’s leading live entertainment company.
Based on my passion for science - and five years of science studies at the University of Bergen - I went on to establish several music technology companies. Our first tech company was the first international company to be allowed to export music technology to China, and the Japanese company Roland distributed our product globally.
After this we developed and sold music programs to US Army Bands, collaborated with major international music festivals, worked alongside renowned artists, and partnered with trailblazers in technological innovation.
From 2010 to 2014, I collaborated with Dr. Karlheinz Brandenburg—the inventor of the MP3 format—and the German Fraunhofer Institute. Together, we attempted to deconstruct multimedia files into individual elements that could be manipulated separately. Although we didn’t succeed at the time, the vision stayed with me.
In 2020, I learned that someone had finally cracked this code. While impressed, I immediately saw the opportunity for something even greater:
-a tool that not only processed each element of a multimedia file but also allowed users to add new elements to an already existing file, such as multitrack audio and video. What if all this could be done on a mobile phone, with seamless audio- and video communication embedded directly within the same file?
And that’s how the idea of iTO was born.
It took four years to develop and build, but today, the technology, product, and patent are ready.
iTO is more than just a platform; it’s the fulfillment of a vision to transform how we consume, create, share, collaborate, and connect through multimedia."
- Gisle Johnsen -