Earlier this month, MBW reported that senior music biz sources were telling us that Apollo Global Management had part-financed Sony Music Group‘s $1 billion+ acquisition of Queen’s catalog.
Today (July 26), Apollo confirmed that it is the lead investor in a USD $700 million “capital solution” for Sony Music Group.
This “capital solution”, says Apollo, is intended to fund “investments in the music industry”.
Apollo Partner Jamshid Ehsani said: “We are pleased to provide a bespoke capital solution to an affiliate of one of the world’s leading companies. This investment allows our clients to invest in high grade securities while helping Sony to execute its business plans.”
As we reported July 4, Apollo – which has approximately $671 billion of assets under management – has already been active elsewhere in the music rights market in recent years.
In 2022, Apollo led what it claimed to be the “largest-ever” ABS (asset-backed securities) transaction for Concord, when the latter company priced a $1.8 billion bond offering backed by over 1 million music copyrights.
Meanwhile, in 2021, former Tempo Music CEO Sherrese Clarke Soares set up HarbourView Equity Partners with backing from Apollo. HarbourView has since amassed roughly $1.6 billion in “regulatory managed assets”.
Apollo also recently backed Concord in the latter company’s bid to acquire the assets of Hipgnosis Songs Fund (HSF).
Concord officially pulled out of the HSF bidding war in May, leaving global investment giant Blackstone as the frontrunner in the takeover battle for HSF.
Before that outcome, Apollo had committed both debt and minority equity to a bidding entity (Concord Chorus Ltd) that offered $1.51 billion to acquire HSF.
Earlier today, Hipgnosis Songs Fund confirmed that it would be delisting from the London Stock Exchange next week, effectively rubber-stamping Blackstone’s takeover of HSF.
Sony Music Group is understood to be buying Queen’s global music publishing rights, their ‘name and likeness’ rights, plus their recorded music interests — including their recording copyrights outside of North America, where their masters are owned by Disney Music Group.Music Business Worldwide