TORONTO — The growing success of Canadian music around the world helped to propel a history-making year of royalty collections for SOCAN in 2018, the company announced Thursday.
In a news release announcing its preliminary year-end results, SOCAN said it brought in and paid out record royalties to more members than ever, with combined domestic and international collections increasing by at least 11% over 2017 figures. SOCAN counts nearly 160,000 songwriters, composers, music publishers and visual artists among its direct members. All financial figures in its news release are estimates, with final figures to be determined following the March 2019 meeting of SOCAN’s board of directors and to be released during SOCAN’s annual general meeting in June.
SOCAN said its members once again enjoyed sizable growth in their export music, or music played internationally. According to SOCAN’s preliminary financial results, total 2018 international royalties are estimated to be at least $87 million, an increase of 15% over 2017. In addition to the global success of Canadian music creators, SOCAN credited pioneering technology, unsurpassed search capabilities, improved data-matching, and a devoted SOCAN International Relations, Membership, Licensing and Distribution team for securing markedly better returns for its members.
Overall, SOCAN collected at least $374 million in total revenues in 2018, which is a new record and an 11% increase over the nearly $338 million collected in 2017. Of that, $315 million was distributed to SOCAN members, an increase from $295 million in 2017.
Domestic revenue accounted for $282 million of the royalties collected by SOCAN in 2018, an increase of 8% from last year’s record, and a 25% increase since 2013, SOCAN said.
According to SOCAN, royalties from non-Canadian sources are the top revenue stream for SOCAN members, achieving a 70% five-year increase. Of the world’s top 10 performing rights collectives, SOCAN said it is the only one that returns 100% of the international royalties it receives from its international partners to its members with no additional management charge applied.
Despite the continued increase of digital royalties from the rising popularity of online businesses that use music, SOCAN again called for a more equitable share for music creators and publishers. SOCAN revenue from Internet-based licensed music in 2018 will total approximately $62 million, an increase of 27% from approximately $49 million collected in 2017, according to SOCAN’s preliminary financial results.
“While overall revenues from digitally delivered performances of music continue to climb, music creators and publishers on average are yet to see earnings commensurate with the value that their work brings to these online corporations,” said SOCAN CEO Eric Baptiste, in the news release. “To put it in perspective, the average SOCAN member who earned royalties in 2018 realized only $54 from domestic digital sources in the entire year. This has to improve and SOCAN is working tirelessly to ensure our members actually receive what they have fairly and deservedly earned from their extraordinary work.”
With the acquisition of Canadian-based mechanical rights organization SODRAC, in July 2018, SOCAN expanded its capabilities and offerings for music creators and publisher clients. SOCAN also welcomed nearly 1,000 visual arts and crafts creators to the organization, as well as dozens of new reciprocal agreements in the Reproduction Rights and Visual Arts domains, in addition to the more than 100 existing ones for Performing Rights. Also in 2018, SOCAN launched Dataclef, the back-office services arm of the company, which is an offshoot from SOCAN’s multi-year investment in technology and data assets that places SOCAN at the forefront of the world’s rights management companies, SOCAN said.
