French authors rights society Sacem has reported collections of €757.4 million ($953 million) in 2005, a 4.2% increase from 2004.
Of that sum, Sacem distributed €608.4 million ($765.4 million), over €20 million ($25 million) more than in 2004. The average administrative cost ratio was 14.97%, compared with 15.75% in 2004.
“This is a satisfying year for us, as we were more anticipating a flat growth; but the income from broadcast proved strong,” Sacem CEO Bernard Miyet told Billboard.biz.
Overall, Sacem’s main source of revenue came from television, which accounted for 26.6% of total income. Other key areas of collection came from public performance of recorded music (20.2%), mechanical rights (19.6%), foreign societies (9.1%), live performances (8%), radio (7.6%), private copying (6.9%) and cinema (2%).
Sacem reported a 6.7% year-on-year rise in total broadcast income to €259.3 million ($325 million).
Rights from live performances rose to €59.9 million ($76.1 million) from €58.1 million ($73.8 million).
Detailed figures on mechanical rights are still being processed, as they are collected directly by the society SDRM. Early indications suggest a decrease in rights from audio recordings, which will almost be compensated by a 26.5% raise in video recordings income.
Together, income from the mobile, the Internet, video games and CD-Rom sectors increased 18.3% at €6.6 million ($8,4 million), with mobile revenue accounting for over €5 million ($6.4 million); negligible last year, Internet income now represents €700,000 ($890,000).
“The income from digital is still marginal for us,” commented Miyet. “We hope that the new copyright bill [that should be integrated into French law this summer] will allow a future for online stores.”
The growth of levy on blank CDs and DVDs appears to be slowing. Miyet says, “this is essentially due to the decrease of use of blank CD for music recording, to the benefit of flash-memory or hard-drive players.”
During a press conference held June 22 in Paris, Sacem also presented a set of new digital tools designed to improve its service to its members and cooperation with foreign author societies.
Among them, the extranet IDOLS, described as a first in Europe, is designed to “fulfil Brussels requirements in terms of fragmentation of rights and territorial rights management”, said Miyet. IDOLS will soon incorporate the DDEX format.
Another online service, CATEL, has recently gone live on the Sacem Web site. It allows users to peruse all Sacem’s catalog and find credit information on any registered song.
