Sony 2007 Annual Report Download - page 45

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Sony/ATV Music Publishing
Sony/ATV Music Publishing (Sony/ATV) was
established in 1995 as a joint venture
between Sony and Michael Jackson.1
Headquartered in New York and with
offices in close to 30 countries, Sony/ATV
is engaged in the acquisition and
exploitation of musical copyrights in a wide
and ever-expanding variety of ways. Sony/
ATV owns or administers over 500,000
copyrights by such artists as The Beatles,
Beck, Brooks & Dunn, Leonard Cohen, Neil
Diamond, Bob Dylan, The Everly Brothers,
Fall Out Boy, Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell,
Graham Nash, Willie Nelson, Roy Orbison,
Richie Sambora, Stephen Stills, KT Tunstall
and Hank Williams, among many others.
The Company operates like a boutique—
with intimate, personal attention given to
writers, music supervisors and advertisers—
but with the infrastructure of a major music
publishing company. Other key competitive
advantages include breadth of catalog,
global presence and an industry-leading
administration department.
The fiscal year ended March 31, 2007
was a defining year for Sony/ATV. In
addition to reaching the highest revenue
and profitability levels in its history,
Sony/ATV also had many strong creative
successes highlighted by its writers recently
winning several top Academy of Country
Music Awards. The company also benefited
from the hit Cirque du Soleil show “Love” in
Las Vegas, which features the music of The
Beatles. At the end of the fiscal year, Sony/
ATV acquired the catalog of legendary
American pop songwriters Jerry Leiber and
Mike Stoller, including the standards “Stand
By Me,” “Jailhouse Rock,” “Kansas City,”
“Love Potion #9” and “Is That All There Is?”
Sony/ATV also recently hired Martin
Bandier as Chairman and CEO. Mr. Bandier
previously ran EMI’s Music Publishing
division—leading it to the industry’s No. 1
position—and is widely considered the
music publishing industry’s top executive.
1 Sony/ATV is not part of the SONY BMG
joint venture.
SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT
http://www.sonybmg.com/
During the fiscal year ended March 31, 2007, the SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT
(SONY BMG) joint venture focused on identifying and developing the best new artists,
expanding the fan base for its established and superstar artists, and identifying new distribution
opportunities in the digital realm.
The joint venture earned a total of 36 GRAMMY® awards during the 2007 ceremony, and
released multimillion-selling albums from artists representing a wide-range of genres, including
Justin Timberlake, Beyonce, Il Divo, Christina Aguilera, Dixie Chicks and P!NK. Artist
development success stories included Carrie Underwood, Daughtry and The Fray.
The company also continued its multiyear campaign to expand beyond traditional physical
delivery platforms such as the CD to develop multiple products that can be delivered over a
broad array of channels, particularly in the digital area. The company enjoyed significant
success in selling digital products relating to the mobile phone, including ringtones, ringback
tones and full track mobile downloads, as well as online products such as downloads and
music subscriptions.
SONY BMG also continued to aggressively monetize an asset that was previously
promotional in nature—its vast video catalog. Building on its existing online and mobile
distribution deals for video, the company signed advertising-driven deals with both YouTube,
Inc. and Google, Inc. and launched a series of advertising-driven online video players that
are deployed across its network of artist and label websites.
Sony Music Entertainment (Japan)
http://www.sonymusic.co.jp (Japanese only)
Sony Music Entertainment (Japan) Inc. (SMEJ) is engaged in not only the production of
music recordings but also artist management, music publishing, and other operations. In
the period under review, such best-selling SMEJ artists as CHEMISTRY, ORANGE RANGE,
YUKI, PORNO GRAFFITI and Mika Nakashima made substantial contributions to sales and
income. Efforts to foster the development of new artists, a top priority for the company,
yielded solid results, with promising newcomers including Yuna Ito, Angela Aki, Aqua Timez
and YUI, all of whom recorded brisk sales.
At The 21st Japan Gold Disc Award 2007, four SMEJ artists were acknowledged in the
Best 10 New Artists category, which recognizes outstanding performances by new artists,
while the SMEJ release of Orchestra de Nodame Live was named Classic Album of the Year.
This award honors the top-selling classical album in 2006, sparking a resurgence of interest
in classical music in Japan.
MUSIC