Peermusic CEO Mary Megan Peer and executive chair Ralph Peer II. Photo Credit: Melody Rae
Nearly six months after Concord reupped with ICE, Peermusic has officially finalized “a multi-year renewal” to remain part of ICE Core.
Peermusic and ICE just recently unveiled their bolstered tie-up, with the indie publisher having first joined ICE Core as a direct member back in 2018. Other members of the self-described provider of “market-leading representation for rightsholders” include BMI as well as PRS, STIM, and GEMA, the latter three of which are behind the overarching organization.
Echoing claims made by Concord upon announcing its own ICE renewal, Peermusic disclosed that it’s “achieved significantly increasing royalties” since signing on, referring specifically to “an average Year-on-Year of more than 60%.”
Moreover, Peermusic attributed the royalties boost to (among other things) ICE’s “improved commercial deals,” reach, and capabilities on the processing, matching, and invoicing fronts.
Building on the points, Peermusic’s president for Europe and MD for the UK, Nigel Elderton, emphasized the perceived “international efficiencies” associated with ICE, which in February scored an agreement with gaming metaverse start-up STYNGR.
“peermusic has a global footprint of 39 offices in 32 countries and we have been expanding the scope and scale of our operations,” communicated Elderton, whose company scooped up Oslo’s Arctic Rights Management one month ago.
“There’s a natural synergy between our unique needs as a global publishing firm and the broad reach and international efficiencies that the ICE hub brings.
“The ICE Core representation assists us with bringing top-tier digital music licensing and processing to our songwriters at optimal terms, using advanced technology which underpins collections and the efficient distribution of royalties to our songwriters,” proceeded the Audoo chairman.
In remarks of his own, ICE chief commercial officer Ben McEwen touted Peermusic’s position “at the forefront of multi-territorial developments” and his broader objective of working “to build for further sustained growth into the future.”
Besides Peermusic’s aforementioned deal for Arctic Rights Management, 2023’s first 11 months have seen the business acquire the catalog of bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs and invest in AI music separator AudioShake.
Meanwhile, other ICE Core members have made noteworthy moves and/or announcements of their own, the most significant being BMI’s recent sale to private equity firm New Mountain Capital. Sweden’s STIM, for its part, reported record 2022 revenue over the summer. Finally, Germany’s GEMA posted double-digit growth for last year and, in late July, secured a majority stake in song-play monitor SoundAware.
Notwithstanding the year’s remaining month, SoundAware today went ahead and declared Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers” the most popular radio track in the Netherlands for 2023, indicating that the much-streamed work had developed an insurmountable listenership lead on the airwaves.
