PRS and BMI sign new international reciprocal agreement
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PRS for Music and BMI (Broadcast Music, Inc.) today announced the signing of a new international reciprocal agreement, which will benefit the songwriters, composers and music publishers that both societies represent.
Both PRS and BMI have always championed for the rights of their music creators and protected the value of their copyrights. This agreement preserves that shared mission by memorializing those innovative practices and procedures to maintain the highest degree of transparency and accountability in each society. It also tackles key industry issues such as limitations on administration fees and consolidates arrangements related to digital rights flow, among other.
Our new agreement with BMI is a huge step towards making our relationship a true business-to-business partnership. While with BMI we have consistently updated our business practices with the average term of PRS’s other reciprocal agreements being 35 years, it is a high priority for PRS to modernise this aspect of our business and uphold a commercial foundation for our international society relationships.
BMI and PRS have a shared commitment of delivering the highest standards of transparency and service to our affiliated songwriters, composers and music publishers. This partnership with PRS embraces that commitment and will continue to benefit music creators from both of our territories.”
About PRS for Music
PRS for Music represents the rights of songwriters, composers and music publishers in the UK and around the world. As a membership organisation it works to ensure that creators are paid whenever their musical compositions and songs are streamed, downloaded, broadcast, performed and played in public. With over 100 representation agreements in place globally, PRS for Music's network represents over two million music creators worldwide. In 2018, 11.2 trillion performances of music were reported to PRS for Music with £746m collected on behalf of its members, making it one of the world’s leading music collective management organisations.
About BMI
Celebrating over 79 years of service to songwriters, composers, music publishers and businesses, Broadcast Music, Inc.® (BMI®) is a global leader in music rights management, serving as an advocate for the value of music. BMI represents the public performance rights in over 15 million musical works created and owned by more than one million songwriters, composers, and music publishers. The Company negotiates music license agreements and distributes the fees it generates as royalties to its affiliated writers and publishers when their songs are performed in public. In 1939, BMI created a groundbreaking open-door policy becoming the only performing rights organization to welcome and represent the creators of blues, jazz, country, and American roots music. Today, the musical compositions in BMI’s repertoire, from chart toppers to perennial favorites, span all genres of music and are consistently among the most-performed hits of the year.
