Earlier this month APRA AMCOS announced another year of record royalty collections, driven by exponential streaming growth. Of the $386.6m in revenue, digital royalties contributed $110.3m, an increase of $42.5m on previous year.
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Songwriting royalties paid by music streaming services in Australia have delivered 546% growth in APRA AMCOS’ revenue in just the last three years. The rapid streaming adoption by Australian consumers eclipses that even of television in the 1950s or mobile phones in the 1990s, both of which presented a licensing changing-of-the-guard for APRA AMCOS at the time.
Brett Cottle, who steps down as chief executive next year, said, “The rise and rise of consumer subscriptions to music and video streaming services was the key factor underpinning our revenue growth during the year. We estimate that there are now nearly four million subscriptions to one or more streaming services across Australia and New Zealand.”
APRA AMCOS reports 145,189 licensees with 5,403 new businesses licensed over the year. Live revenue had a bumper year, up 15.9%, driven largely by major concert tours such as Guns N’ Roses, Justin Bieber, Coldplay and Adele, where Australian support acts included Rose Tattoo, Wolfmother, Sheppard and Jess Kent.
Total royalties payable to writer and publisher members and affiliated societies (NDR) grew 17.7% this year.
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This is an excerpt of the full article, which appears in the latest issue of Mediaweek magazine.
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