New issue of Music & Copyright with Indonesia country report

The latest issue of Music & Copyright is now available for subscribers to download. Here are some of the highlights.

SPECIAL FOCUS: IFPI reports a ninth consecutive year of increased recorded-music trade sales
The international music trade body, the IFPI, has detailed another positive set of results for the global recorded-music sector. Digital and physical trade sales, along with performance rights and synchronization income, were up in 2023 for the third successive year. Streaming was again cited by the IFPI as the main growth provider, with combined revenue from subscriptions and audio and video advertising generating slightly more than two-thirds of global trade sales. The number of paid subscription accounts exceeded 600 million for the first time, with the net number of additions last year 12 million up on the total in 2022. Vinyl maintained its renaissance while CD sales also increased. Sub-Saharan Africa registered the highest growth rate of the seven regions detailed, followed by Latin America and then Asia.

NEWS FEATURE: National recorded-music trade and retail sales in 2023
To compliment the IFPI global results, Music & Copyright has pulled together all of the national trade and retail sales figures published by the leading markets’ trade groups. Countries included in this issue’s analysis include the US, Japan, the UK, Germany, France, Brazil, Australia, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Austria, Finland, South Africa, and Hungary.

COMPANY ANALYSIS: Rising recorded-music, publishing, and merchandising sales boost UMG revenue to record high
UMG ended its 2023 financial year in a positive style, with increased subscriptions and higher sales of physical formats boosting the recorded-music total, and a good performance from streaming, synchronization, and mechanicals contributing to a rise in publishing receipts. Recorded-music revenue from subscriptions topped €1bn ($1.1bn) in each quarter, while sales of physical formats were up year-on-year throughout 2023. Moreover, licensing finished the year on a high, with sales in the quarter breaking new records. Music publishing benefited from the continued growth in the popularity of streaming, and all four main publishing sectors registered double-digit annual gains. In addition to its financials, UMG also confirmed that its previously announced strategic organizational redesign is expected to generate €250m in annual savings by 2026 through a combination of headcount reduction and several other operational efficiencies.

COUNTRY REPORT: Indonesia
In addition to the usual set of music industry statistics and news briefs, the latest issue of Music & Copyright includes a detailed Indonesia music industry report. Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world, behind India, China, and the US: the country ended 2023 with 277.5 million inhabitants. Despite its large population, Indonesia has always massively underperformed as a recorded-music market, with the legal sector long struggling to gain a foothold because of persistently high piracy rates. However, music streaming’s success around the world is more than rubbing off in Indonesia, with a mixture of services now available offering access to several million local and international recordings. The collection of royalties has also changed. In 2019, the government and the different collective management organizations agreed on a one-stop-shop administration, with a single agency given the authority to collect and distribute royalties from commercial music users. The live sector suffered a couple of bad years because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the measures introduced to control the spread of the virus. However, following a sharp fall in ticket sales in 2020, some live performances resumed at the end of 2021. A more than doubling of ticket sales the following year saw the total return to prepandemic levels.

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