Welcome to Music Business Worldwide’s weekly round-up – where we make sure you caught the five biggest stories to hit our headlines over the past seven days. MBW’s round-up is supported by Centtrip, which helps over 500 of the world’s best-selling artists maximise their income and reduce their touring costs.
Well, five minutes ago it was last year, and now, suddenly, it’s August. Anyone else know that feeling?
With the arrival of the calendar year’s eighth month comes a predictable degree of music-biz summer inactivity… but there were a few things going down this week on MBW that definitely deserved your attention.
For example: Paris-headquartered Believe announced its half-year results for 2023, with revenues up 17.9% YoY in the HY period to EUR €415.4 million.
Elsewhere, New York-headquartered Reservoir announced its latest quarterly results (up 31% YoY), while Deezer did the same. The French streaming service has wound down its revenue forecast for this year as it seeks long-term profitability.
Meanwhile, Dua Lipa was hit with yet another lawsuit over her megahit Levitating, this time from a California producer who says the British pop star used his work in the song’s hit remixes without permission.
See below for five of the biggest headlines from MBW over the past five days…
1) Believe Revenues up 17.9% YoY in H1 2023
Paris-headquartered music company Believe has published its financial results for the first half of 2023.
Across Believe’s entire business, the company, which trades on the Paris Euronext, generated EUR €415.4 million, representing growth of 17.9% YoY.
On an organic basis (i.e. discounting acquisitions made this year), Believe’s revenues grew 17.5% YoY.
2) Reservoir’s revenues grew 31% YoY in Q2 2023
Reservoir Media generated revenues of $31.8 million across recorded music and music publishing in the three months to end of June.
That revenue figure, which was up 31% YoY, was disclosed in an SEC filing published on Wednesday (August 2), showing the company’s financial results for calendar Q2 2023 (first fiscal quarter of 2024) ended June 30, 2023.
New York-based Reservoir trades on the NASDAQ. The company floated via a merger with a SPAC in July 2021.
3) Dua Lipa faces new lawsuit over ‘Levitating’
Dua Lipa is once again facing a copyright infringement lawsuit over her 2020 megahit Levitating, this time from a California producer who says the British pop star used his work in the song’s hit remixes without permission.
Lawyers for Bosko Kante, a music producer, engineer and entrepreneur, filed a complaint on Monday (July 31) with the US District Court for the Central District of California.
4) SM Entertainment and Kakao to launch integrated North American division
After winning in its battle against HYBE for a majority stake in SM Entertainment, Kakao Corp. and SM are expanding their alliance to North America with plans to merge their units in the region.
The companies, in a joint press release on Tuesday (August 1), outlined their vision to combine SM’s global intellectual property (IP) and production capabilities with Kakao’s music distribution network and multi-label system.
5) Deezer lowers revenue forecast for 2023
In April, Paris-headquartered streaming service Deezer told its investors that it expected “double-digit revenue growth, in excess of 10%” for the full year of 2023 vs. 2022. That’s no longer the case.
In a trading update issued this week (August 2), Deezer lowered its official forecast for FY 2023 to 7-to-10% YoY revenue growth, as a consequence of what it called “a more gradual build-up of Partnerships and new Verticals”.
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