"DESPACITO"
Billboard Hot 100 (16 weeks), Digital Song Sales (17 weeks), Streaming Songs (16 weeks), Hot Latin Songs (35 weeks); year-end Top Hot Latin Song and Latin Artist (Daddy Yankee)
When Jesus Lopez first heard Luis Fonsi’s “Despacito” demo, he had an inkling the song had potential. After reggaetón star Daddy Yankee jumped on the track, the chairman/CEO of Universal Music Latin America & Iberian Peninsula was convinced it could be a hit. “I wanted it to be the [label’s] first single released in 2017,” says Lopez. “Despacito” topped Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart just three weeks after its Jan. 13 release and rose to No. 3 on Spotify’s global tally, unprecedented at the time for a Spanish-language track. Then, in April, Justin Bieber lent his voice to the remix. The song exploded -- hitting No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 within a month, generating the most-viewed music video of all time on YouTube (over 4 billion views) and scoring three Grammy noms, including record and song of the year.
Pictured from left: Universal Music Latino/Machete Music/Capitol Latin GM Alejandro Duque, Republic Group president Charlie Walk, Republic Records founder/chairman Monte Lipman, Republic Records founder/president Avery Lipman, Universal Music Latin America & Iberian Peninsula executive vp Angel Kaminsky, Universal Music Latin America & Iberian Peninsula chairman/CEO Jesus Lopez and Luis Fonsi.