This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Business News Digital Labels & Publishers
Snapchat announces new music licensing deals, including with previously litigious SUISA
By Chris Cooke | Published on Friday 14 April 2023
“With over 375 million daily active users, Snapchat Sounds offers a powerful distribution tool for artists and creators to share their music globally”, Snapchat would like you all to remember. Did you remember that? Be honest now. I think you maybe need to write this down on a Post-It note and stick it somewhere prominent.
Why is Snapchat bigging up its in-app music library again? Well, because it’s just announced a bunch of new licensing deals, expanding the range of music available.
Those deals are mainly with song right collecting societies, including Abramus, AKKA/LAA, Albautor, Armauthor, Autodia, BUMA/STEMRA, COMP, EAÜ, GCA, LATGA, SOZA, Soundreef and SUISA. There’s a special prize to anyone who can identify which countries each of those societies are from.
While Snap has done a direct deal with BUMA/STEMRA in the Netherlands, the other societies all come via a licensing arrangement with the digital side of Swiss society SUISA, which represents a bunch of other societies and some music publishers in the digital licensing domain.
And that’s noteworthy because last year SUISA sued Snapchat through the German courts accusing the social media app of allowing songs on its platform that are controlled by the Swiss society and its digital licensing clients without licence.
“Snap’s stance is that it does not use any songs from SUISA Digital’s repertoire”, it said at the time. “This statement is false. A large number of works in SUISA Digital’s repertoire is available on the Snapchat platform and is used by users without Snap having acquired a licence from SUISA Digital”.
But that legal battle is presumably at an end, given yesterday’s announcement, which also included the addition of DIY distributor UnitedMasters on the recordings side, which joins a stack of labels and other distributors in making its music available to the Snapchat Sounds library.
