Welcome to Music Enterprise Worldwide’s round-up – the place we be sure you caught the 5 largest tales to hit our headlines. MBW’s round-up is supported by Centtrip, which helps over 500 of the world’s best-selling artists maximize their revenue and cut back their touring prices.
If, like many people, you took a possibility to unplug this vacation season, right here’s an opportunity to meet up with music enterprise information – with 5 of essentially the most significant business headlines from the previous couple of weeks.
Lengthy story brief: There have been a number of notable developments associated to Common Music Group.
First, on December 23, UMG and Amazon Music introduced a brand new licensing deal that strikes ahead with UMG’s imaginative and prescient for “Streaming 2.0“: Extra segmentation of streaming subscribers, greater ARPU partly as a result of greater subscription charges, and a extra “artist-centric” method to royalty payouts.
In the meantime, on Thursday (January 2), we discovered that Invoice Ackman‘s Pershing Sq., considered one of UMG’s largest shareholders, has closed out a finite-life fund. Because of this, Pershing Sq. is handing over a few of its UMG shares – price 2.6% of UMG’s excellent inventory – to personal buyers.
Elsewhere, a trio of music publishers, together with UMG, this week got here to a preliminary settlement with Anthropic, developer of the Claude AI Chatbot, over ‘guardrails’ designed to forestall the AI platform from coaching on UMG-represented lyrics.
UMG, Harmony, and ABKCO sued Anthropic in 2023, alleging that Claude was blatantly ripping off copyrighted tune lyrics. The case continues.
Exterior of UMG information… Duke College’s regulation faculty seemed on the music IP coming into the general public area within the US in 2025, which incorporates 1924 recordings equivalent to George Gershwin‘s Rhapsody in Blue, Al Jolson‘s California Right here I Come, and Jelly Roll Morton‘s Shreveport Stomp.
Lastly, the New Yr introduced with it a brand new record of Honours within the UK, together with some for outstanding music business personalities. Among the many Brits with new titles this yr are Atlantic Information EVP Austin Daboh, Sony Music VP Jackie Hyde, and broadcaster Jasmine Dotiwala.
Right here’s what occurred when you have been ingesting eggnog…
1) UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP AND AMAZON MUSIC INK NEW DEAL, INCLUDING EXCLUSIVE CONTENT… AND WITH ‘STREAMING 2.0’ AT ITS HEART
Common Music Group (UMG) and Amazon Music collectively introduced a renewed worldwide licensing settlement on December 23.
Based on a press launch, the deal encompasses an “expanded world relationship that can allow additional innovation, unique content material with UMG artists, and development of artist-centric rules together with elevated fraud safety“.
The PR claims that the deal will be certain that “UMG’s artists obtain their industrial potential by [Amazon Music’s] continued product enhancements and unique content material that elevate genuine engagement between artists and followers“.
Talking in an announcement at the moment, Common Music Group CEO & Chairman Sir Lucian Grainge commented: “We’re very excited to advance our long-standing, wonderful partnership with Amazon Music that marks a brand new period in streaming — Streaming 2.0…”
Invoice Ackman’s Pershing Sq. Capital Administration (PSCM) is closing out an funding fund that held a stake in Common Music Group, and is distributing 47 million shares of the music firm to the fund’s co-investors.
The information got here the identical day that Pershing Sq. Holdings, a closed-ended fund owned by PSCM, introduced it had acquired regulatory approval to delist from the Amsterdam Euronext inventory alternate.
Pershing Sq. Holdings managed 10.25% of UMG’s inventory on the finish of 2023, in accordance with UMG’s annual report for the yr. The 47 million shares that Pershing Sq. is distributing quantity to 2.6% of UMG’s excellent shares. After the distribution, the funding firm will nonetheless maintain 140 million shares, or 7.6% of UMG, Pershing Sq. mentioned in an announcement on Thursday.
“The PSVII funds have elected to distribute UMG inventory to their restricted companions reasonably than money as a result of we consider that UMG inventory is considerably undervalued at its present share value, and the tax-free inventory distribution permits our restricted companions to proceed to personal UMG shares,” Pershing Sq. mentioned…
On January 1, 2025, 1000’s of copyrighted works from 1929 will enter the US public area, together with sound recordings from 1924. They are going to be free for all to repeat, share, and construct upon in the USA.
This yr’s compositions embrace basic songs equivalent to Singin’ within the Rain and Ain’t Misbehavin’.
On the recordings aspect, in accordance with Duke College Legislation Faculty, tracks now “open for authorized reuse” embrace a run of tracks carried out in 1924. They embrace George Gershwin performing Rhapsody in Blue, Jelly Roll Morton taking part in Shreveport Stomp, and an early recording from contralto and civil rights icon Marian Anderson… (Duke College Legislation Faculty)
Common Music Group has secured one thing of a breakthrough in its case towards Anthropic – the generative AI platform that’s being sued by UMG (plus Harmony and ABKCO) over alleged copyright infringement.
The plaintiffs within the case accuse Anthropic, which has absorbed USD $8 billion of funding from Amazon, of ripping off copyright-protected lyrics to coach its AI chatbot, Claude.
Within the newest growth, Anthropic has dedicated to implementing already-existing “guardrails” to forestall its platform from ingesting lyrics represented by the plaintiffs. Importantly, in accordance with a California authorized submitting, these “guardrails” can be utilized to future tech developments and merchandise from the corporate.
The music rightsholders’ lawsuit towards Anthropic continues regardless of the brand new settlement. Based on the Hollywood Reporter, “the court docket is predicted to problem a ruling within the coming months on whether or not to problem [a] preliminary injunction that might bar Anthropic from coaching future fashions on lyrics owned by the publishers”… (The Hollywood Reporter)
The newest New Yr’s Honours record has been revealed within the UK – together with some acquainted faces from the music business. These with new titles embrace:
Austin Daboh OBE (EVP, Atlantic Information UK, for providers to music);
Jackie Hyde MBE (VP, Artist & Firm Relations, Sony Music, for providers to the music business);
Jasmine Dotiwala OBE (long-time broadcaster, for providers to broadcasting, to music, and to Equality, Variety and Inclusion);
Steve Lamacq MBE (long-time broadcaster and patron of the UK’s Music Venue Belief, for providers to broadcasting and to music venues)…
MBW’s Weekly Spherical-Up is supported by Centtrip, which helps over 500 of the world’s best-selling artists maximise their revenue and cut back their touring prices.Music Enterprise Worldwide
