Michaël Majster, founding accomplice at Paris-based Majster & Nehmé and a 30-year authorized veteran, described the data-related fears as stemming “extra from fantasy or paranoia than from a concrete, life like, and rational evaluation”.
Throughout his profession, Majster has represented each multi-platinum and rising artists in France, plus outstanding impartial report labels and distributors, and a serious music writer. He has not represented UMG or Downtown.
He’s rated within the high tier of music legislation practitioners in France by the industry-standard Décideurs Leaders League.
In July, some 200 staff of impartial music firms and commerce our bodies signed a letter citing information issues about UMG’s potential acquisition of Downtown subsidiariesFUGA and Curve Royalty Programs.
The letter contended that UMG’s possession of those subsidiaries would grant it entry to delicate information from impartial labels, comparable to “distribution data – together with artists and track developments, and efficiency on digital platforms [plus] essential enterprise data comparable to pricing, contractual phrases and strategic relationships”.
Majster argued that a lot of this information is already “simply publicly out there or accessible” by means of current market intelligence companies.
“I don’t see how this Downtown information supplies any perception that UMG doesn’t have already got.”
Michaël Majster, Majster & Nehmé
“You may see the variety of streams for every title on Spotify, for instance,” he famous, including that labels routinely use specialised instruments like Luminate and Chartmetric plus ” for in-depth market evaluation.
“When [I’m] negotiating on behalf of artists with a serious like UMG it’s clear to me that [Universal] already has extremely subtle instruments that enable it to know the music market and all market developments,” Majster stated.
“Buying Downtown won’t change the state of affairs considerably on this respect.”
Europe’s competitors regulator confirmed in July that it had opened an in-depth (Section 2) inquiry into UMG’s proposed $775 million acquisition of Downtown, following an preliminary Section 1 investigation.
The EC has cited preliminary issues that the transaction might enable UMG to “scale back competitors within the wholesale marketplace for the distribution of recorded music within the European Financial Space by buying commercially delicate information of its rival report labels.”
The unique November 26 deadline for the investigation’s completion was not too long ago prolonged to December 10.
Addressing particular issues about UMG accessing artist royalty information by way of Curve Royalty Programs, Majster questioned the sensible worth of doing so for the most important.
“I don’t perceive how the info mirrored in artists’ royalty statements may very well be of any curiosity in any respect to a label [considering signing them],” he stated.
“Once you enter into negotiations with an artist — whether or not by means of their supervisor, their lawyer, or immediately with the artist — you possibly can merely request this data,” Majster stated, noting that competing labels often obtain the identical data concurrently throughout bidding wars.
“Negotiations are based mostly extra on what an artist desires to attain sooner or later, which isn’t essentially correlated with what they’ve already of their contracts.”
“I don’t perceive how the info mirrored in artists’ royalty statements may very well be of any curiosity in any respect to a label… Once you enter into negotiations with an artist, you possibly can merely request this data.”
Michaël Majster, Majster & Nehmé
Addressing fears about UMG utilizing Downtown or FUGA’s information to determine rising artists and signal them forward of impartial labels, Majster was skeptical.
“The whole market has a lot entry to information,” he stated. “They’ll all see the streams on a weekly foundation of each track on the planet in each nation.
“I don’t see how this Downtown information supplies any perception that UMG doesn’t have already got.”
He pointed to current major-owned distribution companies – Sony‘s the Orchard, Common’s Virgin Music Group, and Warner‘s ADA – as proof.
“If the [internal partner label] information from a distributor was so essential, then we’d have already seen the disruptive results on the enterprise of the majors utilizing their information from, for instance, The Orchard, Virgin [Music Group], and ADA to benefit themselves. Has anybody actually felt that?”
Common has proposed buying Downtown (plus FUGA and Curve) by means of its indie-servicing division, Virgin Music Group (VMG).
Earlier this 12 months, VMG co-CEOs JT Myers and Nat Pastor addressed inner information safety issues in a letter to employees, stating: “Betraying the belief our purchasers have bestowed on us can be self-destructive: they’d rapidly, and fairly rightly, finish the connection. Which is why we’re proud to say that for the reason that day we entered this enterprise, we’ve got by no means had a single grievance of misuse of shopper data of any sort.”
Majster emphasised that any information misuse by a Downtown-owning UMG would set off extreme penalties: “Any misuse of this information would trigger vital reputational harm and will end in extreme sanctions from the competent authorities within the varied European international locations.”
He famous that such information would usually fall below GDPR protections in Europe, and would possible be lined by confidentiality agreements between Curve and its purchasers.
Crucially, he famous the absence of documented instances of main labels misusing distribution or companies information so far. “By no means!” he said when requested about such situations over the previous decade, including that issues round potential UMG information misuse seem to lack particular examples of problematic practices.
“No particular instances are given [by critics of the Downtown deal] for instance these fears or any probably problematic practices,” Majster noticed.
UMG has maintained confidence that its Downtown acquisition will create “an improved providing within the rising and extremely aggressive label companies class.”Music Enterprise Worldwide
