In 2014, Nas made an investment that demonstrated how the business instincts of a hip-hop artist could extend far beyond music. Through QueensBridge Venture Partners, the venture fund he co-founded, the rapper became an early investor in Ring, a startup developing smart video doorbells and connected home-security technology. Four years later, that relatively early bet became one of the most remarkable celebrity investment stories of the decade when Amazon acquired Ring. Contemporary reports put the headline value of the transaction at about $1.1 billion, while Amazon’s regulatory filings later recorded approximately $839 million in cash consideration net of cash acquired. Forbes subsequently reported that Nas personally pocketed at least $25 million from the transaction, turning a technology investment into a major financial success.
The story is particularly interesting because Nas was already famous as one of hip-hop’s most influential artists, but his investment activity showed a different side of his career. In 2013, he founded QueensBridge Venture Partners, named after the Queensbridge housing projects in New York where he grew up. Rather than limiting his financial interests to entertainment, Nas and his investment partners began backing young technology companies, often at an early stage when their future was uncertain.
