Photo Credit: Diliara Garifullina
As BMI appeals the appellate court’s decision to overturn its significant live event rate hike, some interesting market share stats are revealed.
Yesterday, Digital Music News first broke the news that an appeals court overturned BMI’s major rate hike for live events, which was forcing promoters to pay more than double their previous rate. That might not be all bad for BMI—the court still suggested that BMI might potentially be owed an increase, nonetheless. But BMI’s move to appeal the decision has revealed some interesting data surrounding the U.S. performance rights organization (PRO) market.
To provide some background information, a performance rights organization monitors all public performances of copyrighted works, pools all the revenue, and divides it among the rights-owning publishers and songwriters.
Interestingly, ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors & Publishers) and BMI (Broadcast Music Inc.) control nearly 92% of this market, according to the filed research. Meanwhile, Global Music Rights (GMR), a newcomer created by Irving Azoff, is fast approaching 5%, representing some serious superstar catalogs.
“Four PROs control the market for music performance licenses: BMI; ASCAP; the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers (SESAC); and Global Music Rights (GMR). The district court estimated that BMI, ASCAP, SESAC, and GMR hold repertoires that account for about 45.4%, 46.5%, 3.6%, and 4.5% of the total market, respectively,” the filing reads.
While their exact market share hasn’t been revealed, other major players in the landscape, based on key metrics such as size and global reach, predominantly cover rights in Europe, the UK, Japan, and China. These include: MSCS (Music Copyright Society of China), JASRAC (Japanese Society Rights of Authors, Composers & Publishers), Germany’s GEMA (Society for Musical Performing & Mechanical Reproduction Rights), IPRS (Indian Performing Right Society Limited), the UK’s PRS for Music (Performing Rights Society), and France’s SACEM (Society of Authors, Composers and Music Publishers).
Also worth noting is that peripheral players like PRO Music Rights and AllTrack weighed in with 0% shares.
That follows calls by U.S. Representative Scott Fitzgerald (R-WI) to investigate both PROs on grounds of ‘deceptive practices’ and fraudulent shakedowns against licensors. Immediately after Fitzgerald raised the concern to the FTC, PRO Music Rights threatened litigation, though a lawsuit has yet to materialize.
Back to the current case: whether BMI’s appeal of the appellate court’s decision will gain any traction remains to be seen.
But given the court’s ruling that such a significant rate increase was “unreasonable” and lacked precedent, it seems unlikely. Watch this space for updates.
