PRS for Music enters into groundbreaking partnership with Orfium for music licensing across the African continent

17 April 2023 - Press release

 

PRS for Music, one of the world's largest music rights management organisations, today announced its partnership with Orfium, the leading music rights and metadata management software platform.

This new partnership dramatically expands PRS's licensing coverage to music users based in Africa, providing access to tens of millions of works, including many of the most successful songs and compositions of today and the last century. Comprehensive coverage provided by Orfium will extend to public performances (including live events), radio, cable TV as well as local and certain multinational online services. 

Orfium will license the PRS repertoire and provide the underlying technology infrastructure used to serve these markets in a highly efficient manner. This relationship leverages the proprietary software platform built by Orfium, and is expected to drive key speed, discovery and cost efficiencies for PRS, which will unlock tremendous value for its talented songwriter members.

In addition, the agreement will expand the global reach of PRS for Music's Major Live Concert Service, the market leading royalty collection service for large concerts, which will now be available for events held across Africa. 

The partnership with Orfium will sit alongside the existing agreement with SAMRO, the collecting society based in South Africa, for its home territories and provide the framework for PRS members to be paid, when their works are used in some of world's fast growing music markets.  

"The African music market is rapidly progressive, driven by a burgeoning homegrown music scene and a new generation of talented music creators. Orfium has both the expertise and tools necessary to ensure that songwriters, composers and publishers are paid when their music is being used across the African continent. This agreement was designed to be flexible, ensuring it can adapt and offer innovative solutions in markets where we are experiencing considerable change and growth" said Sami Valkonen, PRS for Music's Chief International Business Officer.

"We're incredibly excited to partner with PRS for Music. Orfium exists to support and improve the global entertainment ecosystem so that creators everywhere can be paid fairly for their work. Over the last three years, we have invested heavily in building a state-of-the-art rights management platform to support our partners in the licensing and remuneration of music rights in the entertainment industry. Orfium looks forward to working with PRS as their trusted partner to support this incredible region and contributing to Africa's future as a high-growth music market." said Rob Wells, CEO, Orfium.

PRS for Music has one of the largest international teams, consisting of professionals from over 10 countries who speak more than 15 languages and manage agreements in over 100 countries worldwide.  Their rigorous post distribution analysis, revenue tracking processes, audits and royalty claims delivered more than £270 m in royalties last year.