50 Cent recently welcomed Shawty Lo to his G-Unit family, announcing the deal in conjunction with a new mixtape release. But according to Fif, the partnership isn’t an artist signing, but more of a business venture. During an interview with Hot 107.9, 50 clarified the  signing, explaining that the Southern rapper is signed to D4L through G-Unit.

“The difference is, when you say that, they think Shawty Lo is signed to G-Unit when Shawty Lo is signed to D4L through G-Unit, through his actual company, and he’s the outlet for other artists from Southern based areas to come,” said 50. “In this case, I had to bring private investors in to have enough money to go ahead and do the Shawty Lo deal the way it’s supposed to be done.”

50, who was joined by Shawty in the studio, stated that his new business partner will provide Southern artists with an outlet to get signed without having to leave the area.

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“It’s a joint venture, and their route to being able to do business with us at this point would be to go through Shawty here. So you gotta be looking for new talent that’ll be coming to him in different ways, and he’ll be able to say this is it right here,” he continued. “It’s a filter system. Every artist that someone is listening to me right now, the artist that they enjoy from Atlanta or other Southern-based markets gotta get on planes to fly to New York or Los Angeles to figure out what’s going on with their lives and their careers. This is the one route that they can go to someone in the South and make it happen right here, that understands it on a different level. Because on an artist level, he hears the records that he wish he did.”

RELATED: Lil’ Kim Publicly Aligns Herself With G-Unit South At Shawty Lo Concert