It’ll be ?Culture?s Biggest Night.? That?s what BET Networks is promising when the 2022 BET Awards air live Sunday (June 26) at 8 p.m. EST.

And with host Taraji P. Henson presiding over a performance lineup that boasts a newly added Lil Wayne joining Lizzo, Jack Harlow, Latto, Muni Long, Roddy Ricch and many others, the promise sounds more like a guarantee. And that’s not even counting the artists who will be paying tribute to this year?s Lifetime Achievement Award honoree, Sean ?Diddy? Combs: Mary J. Blige, Nas, Busta Rhymes, Faith Evans and Bryson Tiller, among others.

?This year we said, ?Let?s really lean into the music,?? says BET CEO Scott Mills. ?And it?s going to be great.?

The awards show is not without controversy, however. Earlier this month, Lil Nas X slammed the BET Awards after failing to receive any nominations this year despite his continued success since receiving a best new artist nod in 2020 (Roddy Ricch wound up winning that year). ?Thank you bet awards. an outstanding zero nominations again,? Lil Nas X tweeted at the time. He continued, “I just feel like black gay ppl have to fight to be seen in this world and even when we make it to the top mfs try to pretend we are invisible.”

BET responded with a statement noting the artist’s 2020 nomination and performances on the show in 2019 and 2021, saying in part, ?We love Lil Nas X…. At BET, we are passionate advocates for the wonderful diversity that exists within our community.? That didn?t stop Lil Nas X, though. On June 24, he released a new song targeting the network called ?Late to Da Party? featuring YoungBoy Never Broke Again.

Mills spoke with Billboard about Lil Nas X, how he network brands to broaden its scope through streaming service BET+ and content provider BET Studios, and maintaining the brand?s cultural roots under non-Black ownership.

Have you spoken with Lil Nas X and has his complaint prompted discussions about reviewing BET?s nomination process?

I haven’t spoken to him. However, we really do deeply value and respect Lil Nas X so we were caught off guard by the assertion. We work really hard to be extraordinarily inclusive in all we do in terms of the awards show and depictions in our film and TV content. Notwithstanding the hard work we do, we have to understand that there might be opportunities for improvement in some of our practices. So we are looking at our processes to figure out any blind spots that might have contributed to any outcomes. We?ll go through that exercise because we are committed to making sure that we are sensitive to any potential for unconscious bias.

This is the 22nd year of the awards. What kind of show can viewers expect?

There’s some great talent that we’ve already gone public with, but you know Connie Orlando [BET executive vp of specials, music programming & music strategy] loves to keep a couple of surprises in her back pocket ? and she?s definitely holding something back. Also, as you can imagine, lifetime achievement honoree Diddy does nothing modestly. So the performance that?s going to celebrate him is totally genius. As you noted, this is the 22nd year of the BET Awards. And I love when people can bring a creative approach that you can still get excited about, notwithstanding the fact that you’ve seen or been to a million award shows. Given the creative freedom that Connie and the team have developed, celebrating this day is always incredibly fun. In addition to airing BET Awards on LOGO, MTV, VH1 and TV Land as we did last year, the roster has been expanded to include Comedy Central and Pop. There’s also our international simulcast on BET Africa, BET France, My5 and Sky On-Demand in the UK, as well as BET Pluto in the UK and Brazil.

Speaking of Diddy, why is this the year to honor him?

Our responsibility is to use our show to celebrate excellence and accomplishment in our community. One of the things I value about Diddy is how he constantly evolves and finds new spaces to succeed in; his extraordinary journey of transformation is really compelling. When we honor and celebrate people, what we?re also doing is saying to our community that these are things that we value, things that we should be manifesting. He started off as a music impresario then producer, rapper and businessman. That whole arc is really a great message to deliver this year. Next year is the 50th anniversary of hip-hop, so our honorees and show will be anchored in that celebration.

Why no BET Experience music and entertainment festival or a Humanitarian Award honoree this time?

The music and entertainment festival will definitely return next year. The reason why there isn?t one this year is because at the time that we would have had to make a series of long-lead commitments in December and January, there was still such uncertainty around the state of the pandemic. And we wanted to prioritize safety. That was first and foremost. But we?ve already got a team working on bringing back a completely over-the top experience in 2023. Because there were so many opportunities to feature so many amazing performers and performances on this year?s show, we?re not handing out the Humanitarian Award this time. But we will be presenting a big pro-social philanthropic moment during the show.

Besides the BET Awards, the network annually presents the BET Hip-Hop Awards, the Soul Train Awards and the NAACP Image Awards. As awards shows across the board confront lower ratings and other issues, why are awards still an important BET franchise?

Among the plethora of award shows, there is nothing in the world like the BET Awards. It is fundamentally different from anything whether it?s the Grammys, the Billboard Music Awards, American Music Awards or the the MTV Video Music Awards. One of the most powerful lines in our culture is music. So in that intersection, no other show is authentically African American like the BET Awards. It?s something that only we can do. We?ve said this for a long time: that it?s like the Black Super Bowl. And our partners are major companies like Procter and Gamble, Pepsi and McDonald’s among others. They see it as a strong opportunity to engage with our community, and the show does extraordinarily well. It?s generating more revenue in 2022 than it’s ever generated in the franchise.

The success we have with other awards shows is because of the way we position them. In the case of the Image Awards, we thought it was vital to create a platform that shows the world, not just our community, what Black creative excellence looks like. Soul Train is an iconic, fun and engaging show done at a different price point than the BET Awards with lots of advertisers wanting to tap into the emotions of that brand?s particular demographic. And because hip-hop is such a powerful force in our culture, the Hip-Hop Awards have become an important force in our awards franchise. Overall, we just love being there for all the artists and our partners value these shows as a platform to engage with the Black community. For many people, these aren?t just award shows. It?s about the special relationship these shows represent for the community.

In January 2023, you?ll be celebrating your fifth anniversary as the head of BET. What was your vision for the network when you returned in 2018 and your vision now?

It?s all about serving our community. When Viacom, now Paramount, asked me to take the helm I decided to take it because I understood that we had a great media brand, a giant footprint that allows us to play in so many spaces. But the critical key was to make strategic decisions today ? based on where the industry was headed ? that would keep it on the right path so it could continue to thrive and prosper well into the future. So I built plans for what it would entail to build an ecosystem; understanding that while the cable business was this hugely valuable platform, we had to build out additional platforms so that we could create an ecosystem in which we would share content, talent, audience and revenue. And in doing so, we would grow and be able to bring in more content, talent, audience and revenue into this machine.

As part of that we launched streaming service BET+ [in 2019] and the BET Studios platform [with Paramount last year]. In addition to BET and BET+, we?re also serving a broader array of select third-party platforms so that we can be competitive in pursuing any major Black talent. Writer/producer/director Kenya Barris left Netflix to come to BET. We did a deal with Tyler Perry when I was chief administrative officer at Viacom around 2017 or so. At the time, he was in a partnership with Oprah Winfrey and Discovery. And people were like, ?You guys can?t get Tyler to leave Oprah.? Building the studios platform has also allowed us to bring in others like  , Taraji P. Henson and Gabrielle Union. [NOTE: on June 16, BET+ premiered Martin: The Reunion featuring the cast of the popular 30-year-old sitcom ? the first in a series of such specials, says Mills.]

What?s your response to naysayers who ponder whether BET can maintain its cultural roots since now part of Paramount and is no longer Black-owned?

In May, 50 Cent had a meeting with me and my team including our studio head, head of business and legal affairs and head of unscripted content. And 50 Cent was like, ?Goddamn, that?s a beautiful room.? And I said, ?Have you ever done a pitch meeting in a room like this before?? And he said, ?Never.? The point is the meeting wasn?t contrived; we do have a small fraction of non-diverse people on our leadership team. But BET is run and managed by Black people. That?s who the network is: firmly committed to our Black culture. And we didn?t just want to write checks, going toe-to toe with Netflix and others. We really wanted to do something to go up against the issue of racism in the industry. So when we created BET studios, we also started giving invited Black creators equity in the platform.

Heading into 2023, what is the biggest challenge facing the media business?

It?s going to be a very difficult time. The media business was already going through a storm before these economic headwinds began. Through the ecosystem that we?ve created at BET, we?re a 42-year-old media company that put up double-digit growth this last year [BET?s total revenue rose 19% in 2021 vs. the previous year]. In such an economic environment, it’s natural for people to reduce spending, to retrench and cut back. So we really have to manage how to be fiscally disciplined to navigate this period of turbulence. It’s not going to go away in a couple months. So how do we make sure that this amazing engine that we’ve built continues to flourish? That is the balance.

It’ll be ?Culture?s Biggest Night.? That?s what BET Networks is promising when the 2022 BET Awards air live Sunday (June 26) at 8 p.m. EST.

And with host Taraji P. Henson presiding over a performance lineup that boasts a newly added Lil Wayne joining Lizzo, Jack Harlow, Latto, Muni Long, Roddy Ricch and many others, the promise sounds more like a guarantee. And that’s not even counting the artists who will be paying tribute to this year?s Lifetime Achievement Award honoree, Sean ?Diddy? Combs: Mary J. Blige, Nas, Busta Rhymes, Faith Evans and Bryson Tiller, among others.

?This year we said, ?Let?s really lean into the music,?? says BET CEO Scott Mills. ?And it?s going to be great.?

The awards show is not without controversy, however. Earlier this month, Lil Nas X slammed the BET Awards after failing to receive any nominations this year despite his continued success since receiving a best new artist nod in 2020 (Roddy Ricch wound up winning that year). ?Thank you bet awards. an outstanding zero nominations again,? Lil Nas X tweeted at the time. He continued, “I just feel like black gay ppl have to fight to be seen in this world and even when we make it to the top mfs try to pretend we are invisible.”

BET responded with a statement noting the artist’s 2020 nomination and performances on the show in 2019 and 2021, saying in part, ?We love Lil Nas X…. At BET, we are passionate advocates for the wonderful diversity that exists within our community.? That didn?t stop Lil Nas X, though. On June 24, he released a new song targeting the network called ?Late to Da Party? featuring YoungBoy Never Broke Again.

Mills spoke with Billboard about Lil Nas X, how he network brands to broaden its scope through streaming service BET+ and content provider BET Studios, and maintaining the brand?s cultural roots under non-Black ownership.

Have you spoken with Lil Nas X and has his complaint prompted discussions about reviewing BET?s nomination process?

I haven’t spoken to him. However, we really do deeply value and respect Lil Nas X so we were caught off guard by the assertion. We work really hard to be extraordinarily inclusive in all we do in terms of the awards show and depictions in our film and TV content. Notwithstanding the hard work we do, we have to understand that there might be opportunities for improvement in some of our practices. So we are looking at our processes to figure out any blind spots that might have contributed to any outcomes. We?ll go through that exercise because we are committed to making sure that we are sensitive to any potential for unconscious bias.

This is the 22nd year of the awards. What kind of show can viewers expect?

There’s some great talent that we’ve already gone public with, but you know Connie Orlando [BET executive vp of specials, music programming & music strategy] loves to keep a couple of surprises in her back pocket ? and she?s definitely holding something back. Also, as you can imagine, lifetime achievement honoree Diddy does nothing modestly. So the performance that?s going to celebrate him is totally genius. As you noted, this is the 22nd year of the BET Awards. And I love when people can bring a creative approach that you can still get excited about, notwithstanding the fact that you’ve seen or been to a million award shows. Given the creative freedom that Connie and the team have developed, celebrating this day is always incredibly fun. In addition to airing BET Awards on LOGO, MTV, VH1 and TV Land as we did last year, the roster has been expanded to include Comedy Central and Pop. There’s also our international simulcast on BET Africa, BET France, My5 and Sky On-Demand in the UK, as well as BET Pluto in the UK and Brazil.

Speaking of Diddy, why is this the year to honor him?

Our responsibility is to use our show to celebrate excellence and accomplishment in our community. One of the things I value about Diddy is how he constantly evolves and finds new spaces to succeed in; his extraordinary journey of transformation is really compelling. When we honor and celebrate people, what we?re also doing is saying to our community that these are things that we value, things that we should be manifesting. He started off as a music impresario then producer, rapper and businessman. That whole arc is really a great message to deliver this year. Next year is the 50th anniversary of hip-hop, so our honorees and show will be anchored in that celebration.

Why no BET Experience music and entertainment festival or a Humanitarian Award honoree this time?

The music and entertainment festival will definitely return next year. The reason why there isn?t one this year is because at the time that we would have had to make a series of long-lead commitments in December and January, there was still such uncertainty around the state of the pandemic. And we wanted to prioritize safety. That was first and foremost. But we?ve already got a team working on bringing back a completely over-the top experience in 2023. Because there were so many opportunities to feature so many amazing performers and performances on this year?s show, we?re not handing out the Humanitarian Award this time. But we will be presenting a big pro-social philanthropic moment during the show.

Besides the BET Awards, the network annually presents the BET Hip-Hop Awards, the Soul Train Awards and the NAACP Image Awards. As awards shows across the board confront lower ratings and other issues, why are awards still an important BET franchise?

Among the plethora of award shows, there is nothing in the world like the BET Awards. It is fundamentally different from anything whether it?s the Grammys, the Billboard Music Awards, American Music Awards or the the MTV Video Music Awards. One of the most powerful lines in our culture is music. So in that intersection, no other show is authentically African American like the BET Awards. It?s something that only we can do. We?ve said this for a long time: that it?s like the Black Super Bowl. And our partners are major companies like Procter and Gamble, Pepsi and McDonald’s among others. They see it as a strong opportunity to engage with our community, and the show does extraordinarily well. It?s generating more revenue in 2022 than it’s ever generated in the franchise.

The success we have with other awards shows is because of the way we position them. In the case of the Image Awards, we thought it was vital to create a platform that shows the world, not just our community, what Black creative excellence looks like. Soul Train is an iconic, fun and engaging show done at a different price point than the BET Awards with lots of advertisers wanting to tap into the emotions of that brand?s particular demographic. And because hip-hop is such a powerful force in our culture, the Hip-Hop Awards have become an important force in our awards franchise. Overall, we just love being there for all the artists and our partners value these shows as a platform to engage with the Black community. For many people, these aren?t just award shows. It?s about the special relationship these shows represent for the community.

In January 2023, you?ll be celebrating your fifth anniversary as the head of BET. What was your vision for the network when you returned in 2018 and your vision now?

It?s all about serving our community. When Viacom, now Paramount, asked me to take the helm I decided to take it because I understood that we had a great media brand, a giant footprint that allows us to play in so many spaces. But the critical key was to make strategic decisions today ? based on where the industry was headed ? that would keep it on the right path so it could continue to thrive and prosper well into the future. So I built plans for what it would entail to build an ecosystem; understanding that while the cable business was this hugely valuable platform, we had to build out additional platforms so that we could create an ecosystem in which we would share content, talent, audience and revenue. And in doing so, we would grow and be able to bring in more content, talent, audience and revenue into this machine.

As part of that we launched streaming service BET+ [in 2019] and the BET Studios platform [with Paramount last year]. In addition to BET and BET+, we?re also serving a broader array of select third-party platforms so that we can be competitive in pursuing any major Black talent. Writer/producer/director Kenya Barris left Netflix to come to BET. We did a deal with Tyler Perry when I was chief administrative officer at Viacom around 2017 or so. At the time, he was in a partnership with Oprah Winfrey and Discovery. And people were like, ?You guys can?t get Tyler to leave Oprah.? Building the studios platform has also allowed us to bring in others like  , Taraji P. Henson and Gabrielle Union. [NOTE: on June 16, BET+ premiered Martin: The Reunion featuring the cast of the popular 30-year-old sitcom ? the first in a series of such specials, says Mills.]

What?s your response to naysayers who ponder whether BET can maintain its cultural roots since now part of Paramount and is no longer Black-owned?

In May, 50 Cent had a meeting with me and my team including our studio head, head of business and legal affairs and head of unscripted content. And 50 Cent was like, ?Goddamn, that?s a beautiful room.? And I said, ?Have you ever done a pitch meeting in a room like this before?? And he said, ?Never.? The point is the meeting wasn?t contrived; we do have a small fraction of non-diverse people on our leadership team. But BET is run and managed by Black people. That?s who the network is: firmly committed to our Black culture. And we didn?t just want to write checks, going toe-to toe with Netflix and others. We really wanted to do something to go up against the issue of racism in the industry. So when we created BET studios, we also started giving invited Black creators equity in the platform.

Heading into 2023, what is the biggest challenge facing the media business?

It?s going to be a very difficult time. The media business was already going through a storm before these economic headwinds began. Through the ecosystem that we?ve created at BET, we?re a 42-year-old media company that put up double-digit growth this last year [BET?s total revenue rose 19% in 2021 vs. the previous year]. In such an economic environment, it’s natural for people to reduce spending, to retrench and cut back. So we really have to manage how to be fiscally disciplined to navigate this period of turbulence. It’s not going to go away in a couple months. So how do we make sure that this amazing engine that we’ve built continues to flourish? That is the balance.

It’ll be ?Culture?s Biggest Night.? That?s what BET Networks is promising when the 2022 BET Awards air live Sunday (June 26) at 8 p.m. EST.

And with host Taraji P. Henson presiding over a performance lineup that boasts a newly added Lil Wayne joining Lizzo, Jack Harlow, Latto, Muni Long, Roddy Ricch and many others, the promise sounds more like a guarantee. And that’s not even counting the artists who will be paying tribute to this year?s Lifetime Achievement Award honoree, Sean ?Diddy? Combs: Mary J. Blige, Nas, Busta Rhymes, Faith Evans and Bryson Tiller, among others.

?This year we said, ?Let?s really lean into the music,?? says BET CEO Scott Mills. ?And it?s going to be great.?

The awards show is not without controversy, however. Earlier this month, Lil Nas X slammed the BET Awards after failing to receive any nominations this year despite his continued success since receiving a best new artist nod in 2020 (Roddy Ricch wound up winning that year). ?Thank you bet awards. an outstanding zero nominations again,? Lil Nas X tweeted at the time. He continued, “I just feel like black gay ppl have to fight to be seen in this world and even when we make it to the top mfs try to pretend we are invisible.”

BET responded with a statement noting the artist’s 2020 nomination and performances on the show in 2019 and 2021, saying in part, ?We love Lil Nas X…. At BET, we are passionate advocates for the wonderful diversity that exists within our community.? That didn?t stop Lil Nas X, though. On June 24, he released a new song targeting the network called ?Late to Da Party? featuring YoungBoy Never Broke Again.

Mills spoke with Billboard about Lil Nas X, how he network brands to broaden its scope through streaming service BET+ and content provider BET Studios, and maintaining the brand?s cultural roots under non-Black ownership.

Have you spoken with Lil Nas X and has his complaint prompted discussions about reviewing BET?s nomination process?

I haven’t spoken to him. However, we really do deeply value and respect Lil Nas X so we were caught off guard by the assertion. We work really hard to be extraordinarily inclusive in all we do in terms of the awards show and depictions in our film and TV content. Notwithstanding the hard work we do, we have to understand that there might be opportunities for improvement in some of our practices. So we are looking at our processes to figure out any blind spots that might have contributed to any outcomes. We?ll go through that exercise because we are committed to making sure that we are sensitive to any potential for unconscious bias.

This is the 22nd year of the awards. What kind of show can viewers expect?

There’s some great talent that we’ve already gone public with, but you know Connie Orlando [BET executive vp of specials, music programming & music strategy] loves to keep a couple of surprises in her back pocket ? and she?s definitely holding something back. Also, as you can imagine, lifetime achievement honoree Diddy does nothing modestly. So the performance that?s going to celebrate him is totally genius. As you noted, this is the 22nd year of the BET Awards. And I love when people can bring a creative approach that you can still get excited about, notwithstanding the fact that you’ve seen or been to a million award shows. Given the creative freedom that Connie and the team have developed, celebrating this day is always incredibly fun. In addition to airing BET Awards on LOGO, MTV, VH1 and TV Land as we did last year, the roster has been expanded to include Comedy Central and Pop. There’s also our international simulcast on BET Africa, BET France, My5 and Sky On-Demand in the UK, as well as BET Pluto in the UK and Brazil.

Speaking of Diddy, why is this the year to honor him?

Our responsibility is to use our show to celebrate excellence and accomplishment in our community. One of the things I value about Diddy is how he constantly evolves and finds new spaces to succeed in; his extraordinary journey of transformation is really compelling. When we honor and celebrate people, what we?re also doing is saying to our community that these are things that we value, things that we should be manifesting. He started off as a music impresario then producer, rapper and businessman. That whole arc is really a great message to deliver this year. Next year is the 50th anniversary of hip-hop, so our honorees and show will be anchored in that celebration.

Why no BET Experience music and entertainment festival or a Humanitarian Award honoree this time?

The music and entertainment festival will definitely return next year. The reason why there isn?t one this year is because at the time that we would have had to make a series of long-lead commitments in December and January, there was still such uncertainty around the state of the pandemic. And we wanted to prioritize safety. That was first and foremost. But we?ve already got a team working on bringing back a completely over-the top experience in 2023. Because there were so many opportunities to feature so many amazing performers and performances on this year?s show, we?re not handing out the Humanitarian Award this time. But we will be presenting a big pro-social philanthropic moment during the show.

Besides the BET Awards, the network annually presents the BET Hip-Hop Awards, the Soul Train Awards and the NAACP Image Awards. As awards shows across the board confront lower ratings and other issues, why are awards still an important BET franchise?

Among the plethora of award shows, there is nothing in the world like the BET Awards. It is fundamentally different from anything whether it?s the Grammys, the Billboard Music Awards, American Music Awards or the the MTV Video Music Awards. One of the most powerful lines in our culture is music. So in that intersection, no other show is authentically African American like the BET Awards. It?s something that only we can do. We?ve said this for a long time: that it?s like the Black Super Bowl. And our partners are major companies like Procter and Gamble, Pepsi and McDonald’s among others. They see it as a strong opportunity to engage with our community, and the show does extraordinarily well. It?s generating more revenue in 2022 than it’s ever generated in the franchise.

The success we have with other awards shows is because of the way we position them. In the case of the Image Awards, we thought it was vital to create a platform that shows the world, not just our community, what Black creative excellence looks like. Soul Train is an iconic, fun and engaging show done at a different price point than the BET Awards with lots of advertisers wanting to tap into the emotions of that brand?s particular demographic. And because hip-hop is such a powerful force in our culture, the Hip-Hop Awards have become an important force in our awards franchise. Overall, we just love being there for all the artists and our partners value these shows as a platform to engage with the Black community. For many people, these aren?t just award shows. It?s about the special relationship these shows represent for the community.

In January 2023, you?ll be celebrating your fifth anniversary as the head of BET. What was your vision for the network when you returned in 2018 and your vision now?

It?s all about serving our community. When Viacom, now Paramount, asked me to take the helm I decided to take it because I understood that we had a great media brand, a giant footprint that allows us to play in so many spaces. But the critical key was to make strategic decisions today ? based on where the industry was headed ? that would keep it on the right path so it could continue to thrive and prosper well into the future. So I built plans for what it would entail to build an ecosystem; understanding that while the cable business was this hugely valuable platform, we had to build out additional platforms so that we could create an ecosystem in which we would share content, talent, audience and revenue. And in doing so, we would grow and be able to bring in more content, talent, audience and revenue into this machine.

As part of that we launched streaming service BET+ [in 2019] and the BET Studios platform [with Paramount last year]. In addition to BET and BET+, we?re also serving a broader array of select third-party platforms so that we can be competitive in pursuing any major Black talent. Writer/producer/director Kenya Barris left Netflix to come to BET. We did a deal with Tyler Perry when I was chief administrative officer at Viacom around 2017 or so. At the time, he was in a partnership with Oprah Winfrey and Discovery. And people were like, ?You guys can?t get Tyler to leave Oprah.? Building the studios platform has also allowed us to bring in others like  , Taraji P. Henson and Gabrielle Union. [NOTE: on June 16, BET+ premiered Martin: The Reunion featuring the cast of the popular 30-year-old sitcom ? the first in a series of such specials, says Mills.]

What?s your response to naysayers who ponder whether BET can maintain its cultural roots since now part of Paramount and is no longer Black-owned?

In May, 50 Cent had a meeting with me and my team including our studio head, head of business and legal affairs and head of unscripted content. And 50 Cent was like, ?Goddamn, that?s a beautiful room.? And I said, ?Have you ever done a pitch meeting in a room like this before?? And he said, ?Never.? The point is the meeting wasn?t contrived; we do have a small fraction of non-diverse people on our leadership team. But BET is run and managed by Black people. That?s who the network is: firmly committed to our Black culture. And we didn?t just want to write checks, going toe-to toe with Netflix and others. We really wanted to do something to go up against the issue of racism in the industry. So when we created BET studios, we also started giving invited Black creators equity in the platform.

Heading into 2023, what is the biggest challenge facing the media business?

It?s going to be a very difficult time. The media business was already going through a storm before these economic headwinds began. Through the ecosystem that we?ve created at BET, we?re a 42-year-old media company that put up double-digit growth this last year [BET?s total revenue rose 19% in 2021 vs. the previous year]. In such an economic environment, it’s natural for people to reduce spending, to retrench and cut back. So we really have to manage how to be fiscally disciplined to navigate this period of turbulence. It’s not going to go away in a couple months. So how do we make sure that this amazing engine that we’ve built continues to flourish? That is the balance.

Marquee producer Julio Reyes Copello (Marc Anthony, Jennifer Lopez, Alejandro Sanz) is an educator at heart. Sit with him in his studio and he?ll enthusiastically walk you through the fine points of recording, arrangement and technology.

The Colombian-born Reyes Copello, who has long mentored up and coming talent from in and out of the studio, has now formalized his second passion with Art House Academy, a music performance, production and sound engineering school launched in partnership with Abbey Road Studios and housed in Reyes Copello?s Miami studio.

On June 23, the program presented its first batch of ?graduating? performers: 21-year old Colombian pop songstress Ela; 17-year-old singer/songwriter Joaquina; Riza, a 25-year-old Filipino/Cuban R&B singer; Teo Bok, an 18-year-old half Italian, half German pop singer who is fluent in Spanish, and singer songwriter Paola, winner of The Voice Kids in 2013.

All have distinct musical styles but boast impressive vocals and stage presence. Each performed one song for a room packed with family and industry VIPs, including Jesús López, the chairman/CEO of Universal Music Latin America & Iberian Penninsula, and Universal Music Latino president Angel Kaminsky, who have partnered with Reyes Copello to release their music commercially via Universal Music Latino.

?At least one of these five kids with talent will become a big star,? said López during a pre-show chat with Reyes Copello. ?Not all of them. Because this business is not just about talent.?

The notion of connecting the dots between education and chops and the hardcore reality and challenge of real-life music business are what led Reyes Copello to seek out the Abbey Road franchise, which was developed at Abbey Road studios and is built on a hands-on curriculum created by producers and engineers, and awards a one-year diploma in music production and sound engineering.

Reyes, who believes in mentorship, wanted to create a boutique program that also took advantage of his many connections and clients, including sessions with the many artists who record in the studio. Students learn both in the recording studios and in an upstairs classroom where each of 15 gleaming new desks comes equipped with an Apple desktop computer.

?I didn?t want classes of 100 people. I designed a format for 10 songwriters and producers and and five artists,? says Reyes Copello. ?Each artist has to release en EP at the end of their year.?

But what to do so those EPs don?t get lost in the fray of thousands of releases?

?I have to admit I prayed to God for help, and he sent me Jesus,? quips Reyes Copello, motioning to López.

Art House Academy students surrounded by Universal Music Latin staff and executives at Art House Studios

?Universal?s involvement is the result of our long friendship, and Julio?s love for education is something I?ve heard him espouse for 20 years,? says López. The partnership further made sense because Abbey Road is part of the Universal family.

?I think those of us who work in the music business have social responsibility. And although I create trends, my goal is that with the help of Julio and my team we can show that what seems impossible is possible.?

Although each artist will have their individual contract, López says the music will be released and marketed as part of a single project to further raise awareness and traction, with Kaminsky helming the releases.

As far as advice for the budding stars, López says: ?Believe in yourself. That?s it. What works for one person may not work for another. When you have faith in yourself and you have a team that supports that faith, you have success. Believe in yourself.?

Marquee producer Julio Reyes Copello (Marc Anthony, Jennifer Lopez, Alejandro Sanz) is an educator at heart. Sit with him in his studio and he?ll enthusiastically walk you through the fine points of recording, arrangement and technology.

The Colombian-born Reyes Copello, who has long mentored up and coming talent from in and out of the studio, has now formalized his second passion with Art House Academy, a music performance, production and sound engineering school launched in partnership with Abbey Road Studios and housed in Reyes Copello?s Miami studio.

On June 23, the program presented its first batch of ?graduating? performers: 21-year old Colombian pop songstress Ela; 17-year-old singer/songwriter Joaquina; Riza, a 25-year-old Filipino/Cuban R&B singer; Teo Bok, an 18-year-old half Italian, half German pop singer who is fluent in Spanish, and singer songwriter Paola, winner of The Voice Kids in 2013.

All have distinct musical styles but boast impressive vocals and stage presence. Each performed one song for a room packed with family and industry VIPs, including Jesús López, the chairman/CEO of Universal Music Latin America & Iberian Penninsula, and Universal Music Latino president Angel Kaminsky, who have partnered with Reyes Copello to release their music commercially via Universal Music Latino.

?At least one of these five kids with talent will become a big star,? said López during a pre-show chat with Reyes Copello. ?Not all of them. Because this business is not just about talent.?

The notion of connecting the dots between education and chops and the hardcore reality and challenge of real-life music business are what led Reyes Copello to seek out the Abbey Road franchise, which was developed at Abbey Road studios and is built on a hands-on curriculum created by producers and engineers, and awards a one-year diploma in music production and sound engineering.

Reyes, who believes in mentorship, wanted to create a boutique program that also took advantage of his many connections and clients, including sessions with the many artists who record in the studio. Students learn both in the recording studios and in an upstairs classroom where each of 15 gleaming new desks comes equipped with an Apple desktop computer.

?I didn?t want classes of 100 people. I designed a format for 10 songwriters and producers and and five artists,? says Reyes Copello. ?Each artist has to release en EP at the end of their year.?

But what to do so those EPs don?t get lost in the fray of thousands of releases?

?I have to admit I prayed to God for help, and he sent me Jesus,? quips Reyes Copello, motioning to López.

Art House Academy students surrounded by Universal Music Latin staff and executives at Art House Studios

?Universal?s involvement is the result of our long friendship, and Julio?s love for education is something I?ve heard him espouse for 20 years,? says López. The partnership further made sense because Abbey Road is part of the Universal family.

?I think those of us who work in the music business have social responsibility. And although I create trends, my goal is that with the help of Julio and my team we can show that what seems impossible is possible.?

Although each artist will have their individual contract, López says the music will be released and marketed as part of a single project to further raise awareness and traction, with Kaminsky helming the releases.

As far as advice for the budding stars, López says: ?Believe in yourself. That?s it. What works for one person may not work for another. When you have faith in yourself and you have a team that supports that faith, you have success. Believe in yourself.?

Marquee producer Julio Reyes Copello (Marc Anthony, Jennifer Lopez, Alejandro Sanz) is an educator at heart. Sit with him in his studio and he?ll enthusiastically walk you through the fine points of recording, arrangement and technology.

The Colombian-born Reyes Copello, who has long mentored up and coming talent from in and out of the studio, has now formalized his second passion with Art House Academy, a music performance, production and sound engineering school launched in partnership with Abbey Road Studios and housed in Reyes Copello?s Miami studio.

On June 23, the program presented its first batch of ?graduating? performers: 21-year old Colombian pop songstress Ela; 17-year-old singer/songwriter Joaquina; Riza, a 25-year-old Filipino/Cuban R&B singer; Teo Bok, an 18-year-old half Italian, half German pop singer who is fluent in Spanish, and singer songwriter Paola, winner of The Voice Kids in 2013.

All have distinct musical styles but boast impressive vocals and stage presence. Each performed one song for a room packed with family and industry VIPs, including Jesús López, the chairman/CEO of Universal Music Latin America & Iberian Penninsula, and Universal Music Latino president Angel Kaminsky, who have partnered with Reyes Copello to release their music commercially via Universal Music Latino.

?At least one of these five kids with talent will become a big star,? said López during a pre-show chat with Reyes Copello. ?Not all of them. Because this business is not just about talent.?

The notion of connecting the dots between education and chops and the hardcore reality and challenge of real-life music business are what led Reyes Copello to seek out the Abbey Road franchise, which was developed at Abbey Road studios and is built on a hands-on curriculum created by producers and engineers, and awards a one-year diploma in music production and sound engineering.

Reyes, who believes in mentorship, wanted to create a boutique program that also took advantage of his many connections and clients, including sessions with the many artists who record in the studio. Students learn both in the recording studios and in an upstairs classroom where each of 15 gleaming new desks comes equipped with an Apple desktop computer.

?I didn?t want classes of 100 people. I designed a format for 10 songwriters and producers and and five artists,? says Reyes Copello. ?Each artist has to release en EP at the end of their year.?

But what to do so those EPs don?t get lost in the fray of thousands of releases?

?I have to admit I prayed to God for help, and he sent me Jesus,? quips Reyes Copello, motioning to López.

Art House Academy students surrounded by Universal Music Latin staff and executives at Art House Studios

?Universal?s involvement is the result of our long friendship, and Julio?s love for education is something I?ve heard him espouse for 20 years,? says López. The partnership further made sense because Abbey Road is part of the Universal family.

?I think those of us who work in the music business have social responsibility. And although I create trends, my goal is that with the help of Julio and my team we can show that what seems impossible is possible.?

Although each artist will have their individual contract, López says the music will be released and marketed as part of a single project to further raise awareness and traction, with Kaminsky helming the releases.

As far as advice for the budding stars, López says: ?Believe in yourself. That?s it. What works for one person may not work for another. When you have faith in yourself and you have a team that supports that faith, you have success. Believe in yourself.?

Motionless in White snags its third No. 1 on Billboard‘s Top Hard Rock Albums chart with Scoring the End of the World, which bows atop the June 25-dated survey.

World starts with 30,000 equivalent album units earned in the June 10-16 tracking week, according to Luminate, with 23,000 from album sales.

The band, which formed in Scranton, Pa., in 2005, first ruled Top Hard Rock Albums with 2014’s Reincarnate, followed by 2017’s Graveyard Shift. In between the latter and World, Disguise peaked at No. 2 in 2019.

World also debuts at No. 2 on Top Rock Albums, marking Motionless in White’s second-highest rank after Reincarnate, which led the list.

On the all-genre Billboard 200, World bows at No. 12, exceeded among the group’s catalog only by Reincarnate‘s No. 9 start and peak.

Concurrently, six songs from the new release reach the Hot Hard Rock Songs chart, led by first single “Masterpiece,” which lifts 6-5 with 1.2 million official U.S. streams and 701,000 airplay audience impressions. It’s followed by “Sign of Life,” a No. 15 debut (831,000 streams).

“Masterpiece” additionally bullets at No. 18, after rising to No. 17, on the Mainstream Rock Airplay chart. It’s the band’s second-best-charting song on the survey, after “Another Life” hit No. 14 in July 2020.

Motionless in White snags its third No. 1 on Billboard‘s Top Hard Rock Albums chart with Scoring the End of the World, which bows atop the June 25-dated survey.

World starts with 30,000 equivalent album units earned in the June 10-16 tracking week, according to Luminate, with 23,000 from album sales.

The band, which formed in Scranton, Pa., in 2005, first ruled Top Hard Rock Albums with 2014’s Reincarnate, followed by 2017’s Graveyard Shift. In between the latter and World, Disguise peaked at No. 2 in 2019.

World also debuts at No. 2 on Top Rock Albums, marking Motionless in White’s second-highest rank after Reincarnate, which led the list.

On the all-genre Billboard 200, World bows at No. 12, exceeded among the group’s catalog only by Reincarnate‘s No. 9 start and peak.

Concurrently, six songs from the new release reach the Hot Hard Rock Songs chart, led by first single “Masterpiece,” which lifts 6-5 with 1.2 million official U.S. streams and 701,000 airplay audience impressions. It’s followed by “Sign of Life,” a No. 15 debut (831,000 streams).

“Masterpiece” additionally bullets at No. 18, after rising to No. 17, on the Mainstream Rock Airplay chart. It’s the band’s second-best-charting song on the survey, after “Another Life” hit No. 14 in July 2020.

Motionless in White snags its third No. 1 on Billboard‘s Top Hard Rock Albums chart with Scoring the End of the World, which bows atop the June 25-dated survey.

World starts with 30,000 equivalent album units earned in the June 10-16 tracking week, according to Luminate, with 23,000 from album sales.

The band, which formed in Scranton, Pa., in 2005, first ruled Top Hard Rock Albums with 2014’s Reincarnate, followed by 2017’s Graveyard Shift. In between the latter and World, Disguise peaked at No. 2 in 2019.

World also debuts at No. 2 on Top Rock Albums, marking Motionless in White’s second-highest rank after Reincarnate, which led the list.

On the all-genre Billboard 200, World bows at No. 12, exceeded among the group’s catalog only by Reincarnate‘s No. 9 start and peak.

Concurrently, six songs from the new release reach the Hot Hard Rock Songs chart, led by first single “Masterpiece,” which lifts 6-5 with 1.2 million official U.S. streams and 701,000 airplay audience impressions. It’s followed by “Sign of Life,” a No. 15 debut (831,000 streams).

“Masterpiece” additionally bullets at No. 18, after rising to No. 17, on the Mainstream Rock Airplay chart. It’s the band’s second-best-charting song on the survey, after “Another Life” hit No. 14 in July 2020.

Of all the songs the Elvis filmmakers ran by Peter Raleigh for publishing approval, one jumped out at him: “Cotton Candy Land,” a 1963 ballad Elvis Presley sang to a sleeping girl in It Happened at the World’s Fair. “It’s an unexpected choice for an Elvis biopic,” says Raleigh, co-president of Raleigh Music Group, which administers 25% of Presley’s song catalog, who approved the Stevie Nicks and Chris Isaak cover for the film. “But it does work for the context.”

In addition to his Memphis home and museum, Graceland, the late Presley’s song catalog is the jewel of his estate holdings. Graceland draws 700,000 visitors a year, and Presley’s posthumous popularity is constant, with occasional spikes from movies or other cultural events. One came two decades ago when Dutch DJ-producer Junkie XL remixed “A Little Less Conversation,” and now Raleigh ? whose company administers the publishing for Susan Aberbach and her children, heirs to early Presley publishers Julian and Joachim “Jean” Aberbach ? expects a new one with Elvis.

These intermittent revenue boosts are crucial for the investors who have plowed tens of millions into Presley’s estate in recent years. In 2005, Elvis’ daughter, Lisa Marie, sold 85% of Elvis Presley Enterprises to CKX, run by the late Robert F.X. Sillerman, whose other company, SFX, was rolling concert promoters into a company that he sold to Clear Channel Communications to eventually become Live Nation. The cost: $100 million. At the time, “CKX probably overpaid,” says Mark Roesler, whose company CMG Worldwide has represented the estates of Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Robinson and, for six years in the ’80s, Presley. In 2011, a private-equity firm bought CKX, then sold the Presley licensing rights to another company, Authentic Brands Group, for a reported $145 million.

In 2020, the estate?s value was $400 to 600 million, a source told Rolling Stone. Now ? thanks to Presley?s prevailing cultural relevance, with a new film out Friday and publishing valuations soaring on potential future earnings ? a new source tells Billboard the Presley estate is worth more like $1 billion.

“Muhammad Ali was my client for many years. I look around now, and I’m not so sure people remember [him],” says Jay Fishman, managing director of Financial Research Associates, a business valuation firm that specializes in celebrity estates, once appraising Michael Jackson?s estate in a court hearing. “Elvis seems to have endured longer than any of them.”

Thanks to a series of savvy deals by Presley’s longtime manager, Col. Tom Parker, played by Tom Hanks in Elvis, the estate’s holdings include a huge, perennially profitable chunk of his publishing — even though Presley, like Frank Sinatra and others of the pre-rock era, was known as a singer and performer. Parker, who was prescient about the value of songwriters? catalogs in recorded music, demanded early on that Presley (and himself) receive half the publishing on songs he recorded.

“For the most part, if you wanted Elvis to sing your song, you needed to give him half the publishing rights,” says Joel Weinshanker, managing partner of Graceland Holdings and Elvis Presley Enterprises. “I would say the estate controls close to half of the good stuff.”

Aside from Graceland, the bulk of the Presley estate’s value is in the 650 compositions for which it owns co-publishing rights. Billboard estimates Presley’s catalog generated publishing royalties that averaged $12 million annually over the last three years; of that, Authentic Brands took about $4.5 million. The estate, however, doesn’t profit as much from other valuable Presley holdings ? in 1973, Parker made a deal to sell all of Presley?s master recordings to RCA Records for $5.4 million, which means the label pays no royalties to the estate for tracks released before 1973. Nowadays, the Sony Music-owned RCA Records has earned an average $23.5 million in annual revenue over the past three years, according to Billboard estimates. “He consistently is one of our top 10 artists,” says Lyn Koppe, executive vp of global catalog for Sony Music Entertainment and Legacy Recordings. “You’ve got the traditional Elvis fans who know everything about him, and you’ve got other fans who might listen to ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’ because a different artist might have covered it and they discovered Elvis’ original.”

The new Elvis film stands to turbo-charge this kind of listening trend. In addition to the expected selections, from “That’s All Right” (performed by Gary Clark Jr.) to “Heartbreak Hotel Can’t Help Falling In Love ” (by Kacey Musgraves), the film could boost 1968’s lesser-known “Edge of Reality” the way Junkie XL once revived “A Little Less Conversation,” , thanks to a new remix by indie-rock stars Tame Impala. Weinshanker says the estate first went “back and forth with Baz” over rights to songs, as well as other intellectual-property holdings such as the singer’s name and likeness, trademarks, merchandising and, of course, anything pertaining to Graceland, in 2018.

Lurhmann took over an office at Graceland and incorporated the estate’s resources into his work. “If he didn’t know a date of an event, the historian at Graceland had access to his entire life. If Elvis was in Memphis for a day, he rarely paid in cash. If he would buy a car, which he did over 100 times, he would sign a check over to his dad, of which we have canceled checks,” Weinshanker says. “I took Baz down to Memphis and we spent several days going through Graceland and talking about who Elvis was, what he desired, what his fears were.”

The pandemic delayed Elvis production — Hanks was in Australia to film the movie when he famously came down with COVID-19 in March 2020 — until early last year. Today, everyone involved in the estate is all-in for the movie: Lisa Marie and Presley’s late wife, Priscilla, have made effusive endorsements. More importantly, the film is an investment, a marketable product that could potentially generate serious revenue for the estate for years to come.

“Making an Elvis movie without Elvis’s music wouldn’t be very good. People try, but it doesn’t work,” says Marc Rosen, Authentic Brands’ entertainment president. “We think this soundtrack is going to live forever, and hopefully be the entry point for fans to hear about Elvis in an entirely new way.”

Of all the songs the Elvis filmmakers ran by Peter Raleigh for publishing approval, one jumped out at him: “Cotton Candy Land,” a 1963 ballad Elvis Presley sang to a sleeping girl in It Happened at the World’s Fair. “It’s an unexpected choice for an Elvis biopic,” says Raleigh, co-president of Raleigh Music Group, which administers 25% of Presley’s song catalog, who approved the Stevie Nicks and Chris Isaak cover for the film. “But it does work for the context.”

In addition to his Memphis home and museum, Graceland, the late Presley’s song catalog is the jewel of his estate holdings. Graceland draws 700,000 visitors a year, and Presley’s posthumous popularity is constant, with occasional spikes from movies or other cultural events. One came two decades ago when Dutch DJ-producer Junkie XL remixed “A Little Less Conversation,” and now Raleigh ? whose company administers the publishing for Susan Aberbach and her children, heirs to early Presley publishers Julian and Joachim “Jean” Aberbach ? expects a new one with Elvis.

These intermittent revenue boosts are crucial for the investors who have plowed tens of millions into Presley’s estate in recent years. In 2005, Elvis’ daughter, Lisa Marie, sold 85% of Elvis Presley Enterprises to CKX, run by the late Robert F.X. Sillerman, whose other company, SFX, was rolling concert promoters into a company that he sold to Clear Channel Communications to eventually become Live Nation. The cost: $100 million. At the time, “CKX probably overpaid,” says Mark Roesler, whose company CMG Worldwide has represented the estates of Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Robinson and, for six years in the ’80s, Presley. In 2011, a private-equity firm bought CKX, then sold the Presley licensing rights to another company, Authentic Brands Group, for a reported $145 million.

In 2020, the estate?s value was $400 to 600 million, a source told Rolling Stone. Now ? thanks to Presley?s prevailing cultural relevance, with a new film out Friday and publishing valuations soaring on potential future earnings ? a new source tells Billboard the Presley estate is worth more like $1 billion.

“Muhammad Ali was my client for many years. I look around now, and I’m not so sure people remember [him],” says Jay Fishman, managing director of Financial Research Associates, a business valuation firm that specializes in celebrity estates, once appraising Michael Jackson?s estate in a court hearing. “Elvis seems to have endured longer than any of them.”

Thanks to a series of savvy deals by Presley’s longtime manager, Col. Tom Parker, played by Tom Hanks in Elvis, the estate’s holdings include a huge, perennially profitable chunk of his publishing — even though Presley, like Frank Sinatra and others of the pre-rock era, was known as a singer and performer. Parker, who was prescient about the value of songwriters? catalogs in recorded music, demanded early on that Presley (and himself) receive half the publishing on songs he recorded.

“For the most part, if you wanted Elvis to sing your song, you needed to give him half the publishing rights,” says Joel Weinshanker, managing partner of Graceland Holdings and Elvis Presley Enterprises. “I would say the estate controls close to half of the good stuff.”

Aside from Graceland, the bulk of the Presley estate’s value is in the 650 compositions for which it owns co-publishing rights. Billboard estimates Presley’s catalog generated publishing royalties that averaged $12 million annually over the last three years; of that, Authentic Brands took about $4.5 million. The estate, however, doesn’t profit as much from other valuable Presley holdings ? in 1973, Parker made a deal to sell all of Presley?s master recordings to RCA Records for $5.4 million, which means the label pays no royalties to the estate for tracks released before 1973. Nowadays, the Sony Music-owned RCA Records has earned an average $23.5 million in annual revenue over the past three years, according to Billboard estimates. “He consistently is one of our top 10 artists,” says Lyn Koppe, executive vp of global catalog for Sony Music Entertainment and Legacy Recordings. “You’ve got the traditional Elvis fans who know everything about him, and you’ve got other fans who might listen to ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’ because a different artist might have covered it and they discovered Elvis’ original.”

The new Elvis film stands to turbo-charge this kind of listening trend. In addition to the expected selections, from “That’s All Right” (performed by Gary Clark Jr.) to “Heartbreak Hotel Can’t Help Falling In Love ” (by Kacey Musgraves), the film could boost 1968’s lesser-known “Edge of Reality” the way Junkie XL once revived “A Little Less Conversation,” , thanks to a new remix by indie-rock stars Tame Impala. Weinshanker says the estate first went “back and forth with Baz” over rights to songs, as well as other intellectual-property holdings such as the singer’s name and likeness, trademarks, merchandising and, of course, anything pertaining to Graceland, in 2018.

Lurhmann took over an office at Graceland and incorporated the estate’s resources into his work. “If he didn’t know a date of an event, the historian at Graceland had access to his entire life. If Elvis was in Memphis for a day, he rarely paid in cash. If he would buy a car, which he did over 100 times, he would sign a check over to his dad, of which we have canceled checks,” Weinshanker says. “I took Baz down to Memphis and we spent several days going through Graceland and talking about who Elvis was, what he desired, what his fears were.”

The pandemic delayed Elvis production — Hanks was in Australia to film the movie when he famously came down with COVID-19 in March 2020 — until early last year. Today, everyone involved in the estate is all-in for the movie: Lisa Marie and Presley’s late wife, Priscilla, have made effusive endorsements. More importantly, the film is an investment, a marketable product that could potentially generate serious revenue for the estate for years to come.

“Making an Elvis movie without Elvis’s music wouldn’t be very good. People try, but it doesn’t work,” says Marc Rosen, Authentic Brands’ entertainment president. “We think this soundtrack is going to live forever, and hopefully be the entry point for fans to hear about Elvis in an entirely new way.”

Of all the songs the Elvis filmmakers ran by Peter Raleigh for publishing approval, one jumped out at him: “Cotton Candy Land,” a 1963 ballad Elvis Presley sang to a sleeping girl in It Happened at the World’s Fair. “It’s an unexpected choice for an Elvis biopic,” says Raleigh, co-president of Raleigh Music Group, which administers 25% of Presley’s song catalog, who approved the Stevie Nicks and Chris Isaak cover for the film. “But it does work for the context.”

In addition to his Memphis home and museum, Graceland, the late Presley’s song catalog is the jewel of his estate holdings. Graceland draws 700,000 visitors a year, and Presley’s posthumous popularity is constant, with occasional spikes from movies or other cultural events. One came two decades ago when Dutch DJ-producer Junkie XL remixed “A Little Less Conversation,” and now Raleigh ? whose company administers the publishing for Susan Aberbach and her children, heirs to early Presley publishers Julian and Joachim “Jean” Aberbach ? expects a new one with Elvis.

These intermittent revenue boosts are crucial for the investors who have plowed tens of millions into Presley’s estate in recent years. In 2005, Elvis’ daughter, Lisa Marie, sold 85% of Elvis Presley Enterprises to CKX, run by the late Robert F.X. Sillerman, whose other company, SFX, was rolling concert promoters into a company that he sold to Clear Channel Communications to eventually become Live Nation. The cost: $100 million. At the time, “CKX probably overpaid,” says Mark Roesler, whose company CMG Worldwide has represented the estates of Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Robinson and, for six years in the ’80s, Presley. In 2011, a private-equity firm bought CKX, then sold the Presley licensing rights to another company, Authentic Brands Group, for a reported $145 million.

In 2020, the estate?s value was $400 to 600 million, a source told Rolling Stone. Now ? thanks to Presley?s prevailing cultural relevance, with a new film out Friday and publishing valuations soaring on potential future earnings ? a new source tells Billboard the Presley estate is worth more like $1 billion.

“Muhammad Ali was my client for many years. I look around now, and I’m not so sure people remember [him],” says Jay Fishman, managing director of Financial Research Associates, a business valuation firm that specializes in celebrity estates, once appraising Michael Jackson?s estate in a court hearing. “Elvis seems to have endured longer than any of them.”

Thanks to a series of savvy deals by Presley’s longtime manager, Col. Tom Parker, played by Tom Hanks in Elvis, the estate’s holdings include a huge, perennially profitable chunk of his publishing — even though Presley, like Frank Sinatra and others of the pre-rock era, was known as a singer and performer. Parker, who was prescient about the value of songwriters? catalogs in recorded music, demanded early on that Presley (and himself) receive half the publishing on songs he recorded.

“For the most part, if you wanted Elvis to sing your song, you needed to give him half the publishing rights,” says Joel Weinshanker, managing partner of Graceland Holdings and Elvis Presley Enterprises. “I would say the estate controls close to half of the good stuff.”

Aside from Graceland, the bulk of the Presley estate’s value is in the 650 compositions for which it owns co-publishing rights. Billboard estimates Presley’s catalog generated publishing royalties that averaged $12 million annually over the last three years; of that, Authentic Brands took about $4.5 million. The estate, however, doesn’t profit as much from other valuable Presley holdings ? in 1973, Parker made a deal to sell all of Presley?s master recordings to RCA Records for $5.4 million, which means the label pays no royalties to the estate for tracks released before 1973. Nowadays, the Sony Music-owned RCA Records has earned an average $23.5 million in annual revenue over the past three years, according to Billboard estimates. “He consistently is one of our top 10 artists,” says Lyn Koppe, executive vp of global catalog for Sony Music Entertainment and Legacy Recordings. “You’ve got the traditional Elvis fans who know everything about him, and you’ve got other fans who might listen to ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’ because a different artist might have covered it and they discovered Elvis’ original.”

The new Elvis film stands to turbo-charge this kind of listening trend. In addition to the expected selections, from “That’s All Right” (performed by Gary Clark Jr.) to “Heartbreak Hotel Can’t Help Falling In Love ” (by Kacey Musgraves), the film could boost 1968’s lesser-known “Edge of Reality” the way Junkie XL once revived “A Little Less Conversation,” , thanks to a new remix by indie-rock stars Tame Impala. Weinshanker says the estate first went “back and forth with Baz” over rights to songs, as well as other intellectual-property holdings such as the singer’s name and likeness, trademarks, merchandising and, of course, anything pertaining to Graceland, in 2018.

Lurhmann took over an office at Graceland and incorporated the estate’s resources into his work. “If he didn’t know a date of an event, the historian at Graceland had access to his entire life. If Elvis was in Memphis for a day, he rarely paid in cash. If he would buy a car, which he did over 100 times, he would sign a check over to his dad, of which we have canceled checks,” Weinshanker says. “I took Baz down to Memphis and we spent several days going through Graceland and talking about who Elvis was, what he desired, what his fears were.”

The pandemic delayed Elvis production — Hanks was in Australia to film the movie when he famously came down with COVID-19 in March 2020 — until early last year. Today, everyone involved in the estate is all-in for the movie: Lisa Marie and Presley’s late wife, Priscilla, have made effusive endorsements. More importantly, the film is an investment, a marketable product that could potentially generate serious revenue for the estate for years to come.

“Making an Elvis movie without Elvis’s music wouldn’t be very good. People try, but it doesn’t work,” says Marc Rosen, Authentic Brands’ entertainment president. “We think this soundtrack is going to live forever, and hopefully be the entry point for fans to hear about Elvis in an entirely new way.”

LONDON ?Italy?s communications regulator has fined Viagogo 23.5 million euros ($24.8 million) for selling tickets to concerts by rock and pop stars like Maneskin, Pearl Jam and Dua Lipa at vastly inflated rates, thereby violating the country?s strict rules around the resale of concert tickets.

Following a board meeting on June 23, Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni (AGCOM), a government regulator that oversees Italy?s telecommunications, audio visual and publishing industries, also ordered the secondary ticketing company to remove all “illegal content” listed on its platform within seven days.

The fine follows an investigation by AGCOM and Italy?s financial crime enforcement agency, the Guardia di Finanza, which looked at tickets for 131 events listed on www.viagogo.it. As well as listings for Maneskin, Pearl Jam and Dua Lipa, the probe found that Viagogo advertised tickets at increased prices on the site for shows by Vasco Rossi, Sting, Green Day, Placebo, Cesare Cremonini, Paolo Conte and Andrea Bocelli.

Viagogo listed tickets for those shows at prices up to six or seven times higher than face value, says AGCOM. That runs afoul of Italy?s strict ticketing laws, which state that only authorized vendors are allowed to sell tickets.

In instances where Italian consumers are in possession of unwanted tickets, they are only permitted to sell them on an occasional basis at a price that is ?equal to or lower than the nominal price.? AGCOM has not provided details about when the concerts were scheduled to take place or when its investigation was carried out.

In a statement published June 24, translated into English by Billboard, AGCOM says ?secondary ticketing has the effect of inflating ticket prices? and exists at ?the detriment of the community of artists, event organizers and of primary retailers.?

?This is of particular relevance at an important moment for the resumption of the live events sector, after the forced interruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic,? the regulator says.

Responding to the ruling, a spokesperson for Viagogo tells Billboard that they ?respect the decision of the AGCOM, however we are surprised by this fine.?

The company points to a referral made in April by Italy?s Consiglio di Stato (Council of State) to the Court of Justice of the European Union, asking the court to decide whether the laws restricting the commercial resale of tickets in Italy are compatible with the principles of EU law.

?Viagogo trusts that these pending proceedings will confirm it is not responsible for the allegations raised by the AGCOM and all fines will be annulled,? the spokesperson says.

Over the past five years, Italian authorities have been cracking down on the touting of tickets for rock and pop concerts. In 2017, the country passed the first of several pieces of legislation prohibiting the use of automated bots to harvest tickets and banned the commercial resale of live music and entertainment tickets for commercial proposes or for above face value.

Last year, an Italian court rejected Viagogo?s appeal to a separate 3.7 million euro fine issued by AGCOM in 2020. In that instance, AGCOM took action against Viagogo for selling tickets for 37 events at inflated prices between March and July of 2019.

The Regional Administrative Court of Lazio rejected Viagogo?s argument that it a “passive hosting provider” connecting resellers with potential buyers and is therefore exempt from liability under Italian law. The issue of whether Viagogo can be termed as an ?active? or ?passive? hosting provider is one of the issues that the EU Court of Justice has now been asked to determine.

Outside of Europe, last month the Federal Court of Australia dismissed an appeal from Viagogo against a $7 million penalty issued by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission in 2020 for misleading Australian ticket buyers about hidden fees and its claim to be an official ticketing site.

Viagogo has also encountered difficulties in the United Kingdom. In February of 2021, the Competition and Markets Authority ordered the company to offload its StubHub business outside of North America to complete its $4 billion acquisition, after an investigation found Viagogo was engaging in anti-competitive practices.

Adam Webb, campaign manager for U.K.-based anti-ticket touting organization FanFair Alliance, called the fine by Italian regulators ?another body blow to Viagogo?s tarnished and outdated business model. No matter where they operate, this company shows an almost pathological inability to obey the law.?

Legislation across Europe, at both a national and EU basis, ?is catching up with ticket scalping,? says Sam Shemtob, director of the Face-value European Alliance for Ticketing (FEAT), welcoming AGCOM?s strong stance against Viagogo.

?If other enforcement authorities follow Italy?s example,? says Shemtob, ?the hope of a functional ticket resale market, with scalping largely relegated to the history books, could become a reality.?

LONDON ?Italy?s communications regulator has fined Viagogo 23.5 million euros ($24.8 million) for selling tickets to concerts by rock and pop stars like Maneskin, Pearl Jam and Dua Lipa at vastly inflated rates, thereby violating the country?s strict rules around the resale of concert tickets.

Following a board meeting on June 23, Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni (AGCOM), a government regulator that oversees Italy?s telecommunications, audio visual and publishing industries, also ordered the secondary ticketing company to remove all “illegal content” listed on its platform within seven days.

The fine follows an investigation by AGCOM and Italy?s financial crime enforcement agency, the Guardia di Finanza, which looked at tickets for 131 events listed on www.viagogo.it. As well as listings for Maneskin, Pearl Jam and Dua Lipa, the probe found that Viagogo advertised tickets at increased prices on the site for shows by Vasco Rossi, Sting, Green Day, Placebo, Cesare Cremonini, Paolo Conte and Andrea Bocelli.

Viagogo listed tickets for those shows at prices up to six or seven times higher than face value, says AGCOM. That runs afoul of Italy?s strict ticketing laws, which state that only authorized vendors are allowed to sell tickets.

In instances where Italian consumers are in possession of unwanted tickets, they are only permitted to sell them on an occasional basis at a price that is ?equal to or lower than the nominal price.? AGCOM has not provided details about when the concerts were scheduled to take place or when its investigation was carried out.

In a statement published June 24, translated into English by Billboard, AGCOM says ?secondary ticketing has the effect of inflating ticket prices? and exists at ?the detriment of the community of artists, event organizers and of primary retailers.?

?This is of particular relevance at an important moment for the resumption of the live events sector, after the forced interruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic,? the regulator says.

Responding to the ruling, a spokesperson for Viagogo tells Billboard that they ?respect the decision of the AGCOM, however we are surprised by this fine.?

The company points to a referral made in April by Italy?s Consiglio di Stato (Council of State) to the Court of Justice of the European Union, asking the court to decide whether the laws restricting the commercial resale of tickets in Italy are compatible with the principles of EU law.

?Viagogo trusts that these pending proceedings will confirm it is not responsible for the allegations raised by the AGCOM and all fines will be annulled,? the spokesperson says.

Over the past five years, Italian authorities have been cracking down on the touting of tickets for rock and pop concerts. In 2017, the country passed the first of several pieces of legislation prohibiting the use of automated bots to harvest tickets and banned the commercial resale of live music and entertainment tickets for commercial proposes or for above face value.

Last year, an Italian court rejected Viagogo?s appeal to a separate 3.7 million euro fine issued by AGCOM in 2020. In that instance, AGCOM took action against Viagogo for selling tickets for 37 events at inflated prices between March and July of 2019.

The Regional Administrative Court of Lazio rejected Viagogo?s argument that it a “passive hosting provider” connecting resellers with potential buyers and is therefore exempt from liability under Italian law. The issue of whether Viagogo can be termed as an ?active? or ?passive? hosting provider is one of the issues that the EU Court of Justice has now been asked to determine.

Outside of Europe, last month the Federal Court of Australia dismissed an appeal from Viagogo against a $7 million penalty issued by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission in 2020 for misleading Australian ticket buyers about hidden fees and its claim to be an official ticketing site.

Viagogo has also encountered difficulties in the United Kingdom. In February of 2021, the Competition and Markets Authority ordered the company to offload its StubHub business outside of North America to complete its $4 billion acquisition, after an investigation found Viagogo was engaging in anti-competitive practices.

Adam Webb, campaign manager for U.K.-based anti-ticket touting organization FanFair Alliance, called the fine by Italian regulators ?another body blow to Viagogo?s tarnished and outdated business model. No matter where they operate, this company shows an almost pathological inability to obey the law.?

Legislation across Europe, at both a national and EU basis, ?is catching up with ticket scalping,? says Sam Shemtob, director of the Face-value European Alliance for Ticketing (FEAT), welcoming AGCOM?s strong stance against Viagogo.

?If other enforcement authorities follow Italy?s example,? says Shemtob, ?the hope of a functional ticket resale market, with scalping largely relegated to the history books, could become a reality.?

LONDON ?Italy?s communications regulator has fined Viagogo 23.5 million euros ($24.8 million) for selling tickets to concerts by rock and pop stars like Maneskin, Pearl Jam and Dua Lipa at vastly inflated rates, thereby violating the country?s strict rules around the resale of concert tickets.

Following a board meeting on June 23, Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni (AGCOM), a government regulator that oversees Italy?s telecommunications, audio visual and publishing industries, also ordered the secondary ticketing company to remove all “illegal content” listed on its platform within seven days.

The fine follows an investigation by AGCOM and Italy?s financial crime enforcement agency, the Guardia di Finanza, which looked at tickets for 131 events listed on www.viagogo.it. As well as listings for Maneskin, Pearl Jam and Dua Lipa, the probe found that Viagogo advertised tickets at increased prices on the site for shows by Vasco Rossi, Sting, Green Day, Placebo, Cesare Cremonini, Paolo Conte and Andrea Bocelli.

Viagogo listed tickets for those shows at prices up to six or seven times higher than face value, says AGCOM. That runs afoul of Italy?s strict ticketing laws, which state that only authorized vendors are allowed to sell tickets.

In instances where Italian consumers are in possession of unwanted tickets, they are only permitted to sell them on an occasional basis at a price that is ?equal to or lower than the nominal price.? AGCOM has not provided details about when the concerts were scheduled to take place or when its investigation was carried out.

In a statement published June 24, translated into English by Billboard, AGCOM says ?secondary ticketing has the effect of inflating ticket prices? and exists at ?the detriment of the community of artists, event organizers and of primary retailers.?

?This is of particular relevance at an important moment for the resumption of the live events sector, after the forced interruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic,? the regulator says.

Responding to the ruling, a spokesperson for Viagogo tells Billboard that they ?respect the decision of the AGCOM, however we are surprised by this fine.?

The company points to a referral made in April by Italy?s Consiglio di Stato (Council of State) to the Court of Justice of the European Union, asking the court to decide whether the laws restricting the commercial resale of tickets in Italy are compatible with the principles of EU law.

?Viagogo trusts that these pending proceedings will confirm it is not responsible for the allegations raised by the AGCOM and all fines will be annulled,? the spokesperson says.

Over the past five years, Italian authorities have been cracking down on the touting of tickets for rock and pop concerts. In 2017, the country passed the first of several pieces of legislation prohibiting the use of automated bots to harvest tickets and banned the commercial resale of live music and entertainment tickets for commercial proposes or for above face value.

Last year, an Italian court rejected Viagogo?s appeal to a separate 3.7 million euro fine issued by AGCOM in 2020. In that instance, AGCOM took action against Viagogo for selling tickets for 37 events at inflated prices between March and July of 2019.

The Regional Administrative Court of Lazio rejected Viagogo?s argument that it a “passive hosting provider” connecting resellers with potential buyers and is therefore exempt from liability under Italian law. The issue of whether Viagogo can be termed as an ?active? or ?passive? hosting provider is one of the issues that the EU Court of Justice has now been asked to determine.

Outside of Europe, last month the Federal Court of Australia dismissed an appeal from Viagogo against a $7 million penalty issued by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission in 2020 for misleading Australian ticket buyers about hidden fees and its claim to be an official ticketing site.

Viagogo has also encountered difficulties in the United Kingdom. In February of 2021, the Competition and Markets Authority ordered the company to offload its StubHub business outside of North America to complete its $4 billion acquisition, after an investigation found Viagogo was engaging in anti-competitive practices.

Adam Webb, campaign manager for U.K.-based anti-ticket touting organization FanFair Alliance, called the fine by Italian regulators ?another body blow to Viagogo?s tarnished and outdated business model. No matter where they operate, this company shows an almost pathological inability to obey the law.?

Legislation across Europe, at both a national and EU basis, ?is catching up with ticket scalping,? says Sam Shemtob, director of the Face-value European Alliance for Ticketing (FEAT), welcoming AGCOM?s strong stance against Viagogo.

?If other enforcement authorities follow Italy?s example,? says Shemtob, ?the hope of a functional ticket resale market, with scalping largely relegated to the history books, could become a reality.?

The Ledger is a weekly newsletter about the economics of the music business sent to Billboard Pro subscribers. An abbreviated version of the newsletter is published online.

How does HYBE survive financially while BTS goes on break and its members pursue solo projects? Since HYBE can’t replace BTS, it will need to recreate the group ? financially speaking.

Movie buffs are familiar with HYBE’s predicament.

In the 2011 movie Moneyball based on Michael Lewis’s best-selling book, Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane (portrayed by Brad Pitt) was faced with a quandary: The budget-minded, small-market team was losing two of its two best players to wealthier teams. Beane knew he couldn’t afford to replace such productive players with two similarly effective players. His solution: recreate them “in the aggregate,” as he told his disbelieving staff. Rather than pay two superstar salaries to recapture the lost scoring power ? which his owner wouldn’t approve ? Beane wanted to sign affordable players that could collectively replace the scoring of the two lost players.

HYBE, the South Korean K-Pop music company, is facing a moneyball moment now that BTS has decided to go on a ?temporary break? or ?hiatus.? How does a company built on one act replace lost revenue when that act takes a break? HYBE can’t replace BTS. But just as Beane found alternatives to filling lost production, HYBE will use multiple artists to recreate BTS in the aggregate.

Still, while the A’s lost only two of nine starting players, HYBE is losing an act that has historically represented most of its revenues. One analyst estimates BTS’ share of HYBE’s revenue was 60% in 2021, down from 85% in 2020, after HYBE acquired Ithaca Holdings in mid-2021.  That percentage will be even lower in 2022 since HYBE’s 2021 financials had less than a full year of Ithaca revenues. Twelve full months of revenue from HYBE America ? which houses artist management and Big Machine Label Group ? will further strengthen HYBE?s income statement.

Recreating BTS in the aggregate doesn’t require starting from nothing. HYBE has not completely lost BTS. The group will continue to generate revenue for HYBE through sales, streams, licensing, merchandise, fan clubs and other revenue streams. Given the power of the group’s fans, known as ARMY, to get BTS releases top chart positions, even a BTS compilation of unreleased tracks and remixes could easily reach the top of charts in the U.S., Japan and Korea. Proof, a BTS retrospective released on June 10, topped the Billboard 200 album chart despite having only three news tracks.

How well HYBE plays moneyball depends on its ability to create global hits with the seven members’ solo projects. The best-case scenario is success that mirrors the post-Beatles solo careers of John Lennon, George Harrison and Paul McCartney ? three out of four is a remarkable success rate. But history is not on HYBE’s side. Boy bands usually produce one standout star while the other members find more modest success. One Direction produced Harry Styles ? but no other lasting successes. *NSYNC launched Justin Timberlake ? and no other major breakout stars. Michael Jackson was the lone solo success from the Jackson 5. Neither the Backstreet Boys nor the Jonas Brothers produced solo projects that rivaled the success of those groups.

It’s entirely possible that HYBE could cobble together BTS-like sales and streams from three or four solo projects. J-hope will release a solo album in mid-July, according to reports (HYBE has not announced a release date). Jungkook collaborated with Charlie Puth on the track “Left and Right” from Puth’s forthcoming album and has talked about an upcoming solo album for more than a year. Suga plans to release a solo album. Jimin, who scored a Billboard Global Chart hit in May with ?With You? (a collaboration with Ha Sung-wood) and V alluded to solo music projects but have not provided specifics or release dates. HYBE shouldn’t have a problem stirring up interest. A recent Billboard poll showed BTS fans are most eager to hear music from Jimin (28.1% of respondents), Jin (22.2%) and V (21.5%). J-Hope, Suga and RM each captured fewer than 5% of votes.

Maintaining recorded music revenues is one thing but replacing concert revenue is a potentially more challenging task. In 2019, BTS ranked No. 3 on Billboard‘s Boxscore year-end tours list with a $196.4 gross from 1.6 million tickets sold at 42 dates (that?s over 38,000 tickets per show).  Touring stopped in 2020 because of the pandemic and produced limited revenue in 2021. Now, with the potential to sell out stadiums in markets around the world, BTS is sidelined while artists are clamoring to tour, and music-hungry consumers are paying record amounts for tickets. HYBE acts Tomorrow X Together and Seventeen will tour in 2022 in arenas and large theaters, not stadium-sized venues. It?s plausible that BTS solo acts would perform at similarly sized venues (arenas/theaters, not stadiums), too. But given the nature of touring ? where high fixed costs reward larger scale ? 50,000 tickets from four or five arena shows don?t equal 50,000 tickets from one stadium show. BTS is a massive draw for HYBE?s livestreams, too. The Permission to Dance on Stage ? Las Vegas on April 17 was viewed by 402,000 people in 182 countries/regions ? twice as many as witnessed the four concerts at Allegiant Stadium in person.

The comparisons of BTS with baseball only go so far, however. Beane had a good idea of how players would play based on their past performance. But baseball statistics are a lot more straightforward than predicting the success of musicians and recorded music, and history might not provide much guidance here. Many bands have gone on hiatus. There’s a proven track record of boy band members going solo with some success. But there?s never been a band like BTS, a fan base like ARMY or a music company like HYBE.

STOCKS

Through June 24, the % change over the last week, and the year-to-date change.

Universal Music Group (AS: UMG): 20.00 euros, +7.2%, -19.3% YTD
Spotify (NYSE: SPOT): $107.00, +7.8%, -54.3% YTD
Warner Music Group (Nasdaq: WMG): $26.19, +4.4%, -39.3% YTD
HYBE (KS 352820): 148,000 KRW, -0.3%, -57.6% YTD
Live Nation (NYSE: LYV): $86.80, +2.5%, -27.5% YTD
iHeartMedia (Nasdaq: IHRT): $8.22, -3.1%, -60.9% YTD
Cumulus Media (Nasdaq: CMLS): $7.82, -6.3%, -30.5% YTD
Tencent Music Entertainment (NYSE: TME): $4.96, +9.5%, -27.6% YTD
Cloud Village (HKE: 9899): 80.95 HKD, +6.5%, -48.5% YTD
Reservoir Media (Nasdaq: RSVR): $6.40, -2.4%, -19.1% YTD

NYSE Composite: 14,811.55, +5.1%, -13.7% YTD
Nasdaq: 11,607.62, +7.5%, -25.8% YTD
S&P 500: 3,911.74, +6.4%, -17.9% YTD

The Ledger is a weekly newsletter about the economics of the music business sent to Billboard Pro subscribers. An abbreviated version of the newsletter is published online.

How does HYBE survive financially while BTS goes on break and its members pursue solo projects? Since HYBE can’t replace BTS, it will need to recreate the group ? financially speaking.

Movie buffs are familiar with HYBE’s predicament.

In the 2011 movie Moneyball based on Michael Lewis’s best-selling book, Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane (portrayed by Brad Pitt) was faced with a quandary: The budget-minded, small-market team was losing two of its two best players to wealthier teams. Beane knew he couldn’t afford to replace such productive players with two similarly effective players. His solution: recreate them “in the aggregate,” as he told his disbelieving staff. Rather than pay two superstar salaries to recapture the lost scoring power ? which his owner wouldn’t approve ? Beane wanted to sign affordable players that could collectively replace the scoring of the two lost players.

HYBE, the South Korean K-Pop music company, is facing a moneyball moment now that BTS has decided to go on a ?temporary break? or ?hiatus.? How does a company built on one act replace lost revenue when that act takes a break? HYBE can’t replace BTS. But just as Beane found alternatives to filling lost production, HYBE will use multiple artists to recreate BTS in the aggregate.

Still, while the A’s lost only two of nine starting players, HYBE is losing an act that has historically represented most of its revenues. One analyst estimates BTS’ share of HYBE’s revenue was 60% in 2021, down from 85% in 2020, after HYBE acquired Ithaca Holdings in mid-2021.  That percentage will be even lower in 2022 since HYBE’s 2021 financials had less than a full year of Ithaca revenues. Twelve full months of revenue from HYBE America ? which houses artist management and Big Machine Label Group ? will further strengthen HYBE?s income statement.

Recreating BTS in the aggregate doesn’t require starting from nothing. HYBE has not completely lost BTS. The group will continue to generate revenue for HYBE through sales, streams, licensing, merchandise, fan clubs and other revenue streams. Given the power of the group’s fans, known as ARMY, to get BTS releases top chart positions, even a BTS compilation of unreleased tracks and remixes could easily reach the top of charts in the U.S., Japan and Korea. Proof, a BTS retrospective released on June 10, topped the Billboard 200 album chart despite having only three news tracks.

How well HYBE plays moneyball depends on its ability to create global hits with the seven members’ solo projects. The best-case scenario is success that mirrors the post-Beatles solo careers of John Lennon, George Harrison and Paul McCartney ? three out of four is a remarkable success rate. But history is not on HYBE’s side. Boy bands usually produce one standout star while the other members find more modest success. One Direction produced Harry Styles ? but no other lasting successes. *NSYNC launched Justin Timberlake ? and no other major breakout stars. Michael Jackson was the lone solo success from the Jackson 5. Neither the Backstreet Boys nor the Jonas Brothers produced solo projects that rivaled the success of those groups.

It’s entirely possible that HYBE could cobble together BTS-like sales and streams from three or four solo projects. J-hope will release a solo album in mid-July, according to reports (HYBE has not announced a release date). Jungkook collaborated with Charlie Puth on the track “Left and Right” from Puth’s forthcoming album and has talked about an upcoming solo album for more than a year. Suga plans to release a solo album. Jimin, who scored a Billboard Global Chart hit in May with ?With You? (a collaboration with Ha Sung-wood) and V alluded to solo music projects but have not provided specifics or release dates. HYBE shouldn’t have a problem stirring up interest. A recent Billboard poll showed BTS fans are most eager to hear music from Jimin (28.1% of respondents), Jin (22.2%) and V (21.5%). J-Hope, Suga and RM each captured fewer than 5% of votes.

Maintaining recorded music revenues is one thing but replacing concert revenue is a potentially more challenging task. In 2019, BTS ranked No. 3 on Billboard‘s Boxscore year-end tours list with a $196.4 gross from 1.6 million tickets sold at 42 dates (that?s over 38,000 tickets per show).  Touring stopped in 2020 because of the pandemic and produced limited revenue in 2021. Now, with the potential to sell out stadiums in markets around the world, BTS is sidelined while artists are clamoring to tour, and music-hungry consumers are paying record amounts for tickets. HYBE acts Tomorrow X Together and Seventeen will tour in 2022 in arenas and large theaters, not stadium-sized venues. It?s plausible that BTS solo acts would perform at similarly sized venues (arenas/theaters, not stadiums), too. But given the nature of touring ? where high fixed costs reward larger scale ? 50,000 tickets from four or five arena shows don?t equal 50,000 tickets from one stadium show. BTS is a massive draw for HYBE?s livestreams, too. The Permission to Dance on Stage ? Las Vegas on April 17 was viewed by 402,000 people in 182 countries/regions ? twice as many as witnessed the four concerts at Allegiant Stadium in person.

The comparisons of BTS with baseball only go so far, however. Beane had a good idea of how players would play based on their past performance. But baseball statistics are a lot more straightforward than predicting the success of musicians and recorded music, and history might not provide much guidance here. Many bands have gone on hiatus. There’s a proven track record of boy band members going solo with some success. But there?s never been a band like BTS, a fan base like ARMY or a music company like HYBE.

STOCKS

Through June 24, the % change over the last week, and the year-to-date change.

Universal Music Group (AS: UMG): 20.00 euros, +7.2%, -19.3% YTD
Spotify (NYSE: SPOT): $107.00, +7.8%, -54.3% YTD
Warner Music Group (Nasdaq: WMG): $26.19, +4.4%, -39.3% YTD
HYBE (KS 352820): 148,000 KRW, -0.3%, -57.6% YTD
Live Nation (NYSE: LYV): $86.80, +2.5%, -27.5% YTD
iHeartMedia (Nasdaq: IHRT): $8.22, -3.1%, -60.9% YTD
Cumulus Media (Nasdaq: CMLS): $7.82, -6.3%, -30.5% YTD
Tencent Music Entertainment (NYSE: TME): $4.96, +9.5%, -27.6% YTD
Cloud Village (HKE: 9899): 80.95 HKD, +6.5%, -48.5% YTD
Reservoir Media (Nasdaq: RSVR): $6.40, -2.4%, -19.1% YTD

NYSE Composite: 14,811.55, +5.1%, -13.7% YTD
Nasdaq: 11,607.62, +7.5%, -25.8% YTD
S&P 500: 3,911.74, +6.4%, -17.9% YTD

The Ledger is a weekly newsletter about the economics of the music business sent to Billboard Pro subscribers. An abbreviated version of the newsletter is published online.

How does HYBE survive financially while BTS goes on break and its members pursue solo projects? Since HYBE can’t replace BTS, it will need to recreate the group ? financially speaking.

Movie buffs are familiar with HYBE’s predicament.

In the 2011 movie Moneyball based on Michael Lewis’s best-selling book, Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane (portrayed by Brad Pitt) was faced with a quandary: The budget-minded, small-market team was losing two of its two best players to wealthier teams. Beane knew he couldn’t afford to replace such productive players with two similarly effective players. His solution: recreate them “in the aggregate,” as he told his disbelieving staff. Rather than pay two superstar salaries to recapture the lost scoring power ? which his owner wouldn’t approve ? Beane wanted to sign affordable players that could collectively replace the scoring of the two lost players.

HYBE, the South Korean K-Pop music company, is facing a moneyball moment now that BTS has decided to go on a ?temporary break? or ?hiatus.? How does a company built on one act replace lost revenue when that act takes a break? HYBE can’t replace BTS. But just as Beane found alternatives to filling lost production, HYBE will use multiple artists to recreate BTS in the aggregate.

Still, while the A’s lost only two of nine starting players, HYBE is losing an act that has historically represented most of its revenues. One analyst estimates BTS’ share of HYBE’s revenue was 60% in 2021, down from 85% in 2020, after HYBE acquired Ithaca Holdings in mid-2021.  That percentage will be even lower in 2022 since HYBE’s 2021 financials had less than a full year of Ithaca revenues. Twelve full months of revenue from HYBE America ? which houses artist management and Big Machine Label Group ? will further strengthen HYBE?s income statement.

Recreating BTS in the aggregate doesn’t require starting from nothing. HYBE has not completely lost BTS. The group will continue to generate revenue for HYBE through sales, streams, licensing, merchandise, fan clubs and other revenue streams. Given the power of the group’s fans, known as ARMY, to get BTS releases top chart positions, even a BTS compilation of unreleased tracks and remixes could easily reach the top of charts in the U.S., Japan and Korea. Proof, a BTS retrospective released on June 10, topped the Billboard 200 album chart despite having only three news tracks.

How well HYBE plays moneyball depends on its ability to create global hits with the seven members’ solo projects. The best-case scenario is success that mirrors the post-Beatles solo careers of John Lennon, George Harrison and Paul McCartney ? three out of four is a remarkable success rate. But history is not on HYBE’s side. Boy bands usually produce one standout star while the other members find more modest success. One Direction produced Harry Styles ? but no other lasting successes. *NSYNC launched Justin Timberlake ? and no other major breakout stars. Michael Jackson was the lone solo success from the Jackson 5. Neither the Backstreet Boys nor the Jonas Brothers produced solo projects that rivaled the success of those groups.

It’s entirely possible that HYBE could cobble together BTS-like sales and streams from three or four solo projects. J-hope will release a solo album in mid-July, according to reports (HYBE has not announced a release date). Jungkook collaborated with Charlie Puth on the track “Left and Right” from Puth’s forthcoming album and has talked about an upcoming solo album for more than a year. Suga plans to release a solo album. Jimin, who scored a Billboard Global Chart hit in May with ?With You? (a collaboration with Ha Sung-wood) and V alluded to solo music projects but have not provided specifics or release dates. HYBE shouldn’t have a problem stirring up interest. A recent Billboard poll showed BTS fans are most eager to hear music from Jimin (28.1% of respondents), Jin (22.2%) and V (21.5%). J-Hope, Suga and RM each captured fewer than 5% of votes.

Maintaining recorded music revenues is one thing but replacing concert revenue is a potentially more challenging task. In 2019, BTS ranked No. 3 on Billboard‘s Boxscore year-end tours list with a $196.4 gross from 1.6 million tickets sold at 42 dates (that?s over 38,000 tickets per show).  Touring stopped in 2020 because of the pandemic and produced limited revenue in 2021. Now, with the potential to sell out stadiums in markets around the world, BTS is sidelined while artists are clamoring to tour, and music-hungry consumers are paying record amounts for tickets. HYBE acts Tomorrow X Together and Seventeen will tour in 2022 in arenas and large theaters, not stadium-sized venues. It?s plausible that BTS solo acts would perform at similarly sized venues (arenas/theaters, not stadiums), too. But given the nature of touring ? where high fixed costs reward larger scale ? 50,000 tickets from four or five arena shows don?t equal 50,000 tickets from one stadium show. BTS is a massive draw for HYBE?s livestreams, too. The Permission to Dance on Stage ? Las Vegas on April 17 was viewed by 402,000 people in 182 countries/regions ? twice as many as witnessed the four concerts at Allegiant Stadium in person.

The comparisons of BTS with baseball only go so far, however. Beane had a good idea of how players would play based on their past performance. But baseball statistics are a lot more straightforward than predicting the success of musicians and recorded music, and history might not provide much guidance here. Many bands have gone on hiatus. There’s a proven track record of boy band members going solo with some success. But there?s never been a band like BTS, a fan base like ARMY or a music company like HYBE.

STOCKS

Through June 24, the % change over the last week, and the year-to-date change.

Universal Music Group (AS: UMG): 20.00 euros, +7.2%, -19.3% YTD
Spotify (NYSE: SPOT): $107.00, +7.8%, -54.3% YTD
Warner Music Group (Nasdaq: WMG): $26.19, +4.4%, -39.3% YTD
HYBE (KS 352820): 148,000 KRW, -0.3%, -57.6% YTD
Live Nation (NYSE: LYV): $86.80, +2.5%, -27.5% YTD
iHeartMedia (Nasdaq: IHRT): $8.22, -3.1%, -60.9% YTD
Cumulus Media (Nasdaq: CMLS): $7.82, -6.3%, -30.5% YTD
Tencent Music Entertainment (NYSE: TME): $4.96, +9.5%, -27.6% YTD
Cloud Village (HKE: 9899): 80.95 HKD, +6.5%, -48.5% YTD
Reservoir Media (Nasdaq: RSVR): $6.40, -2.4%, -19.1% YTD

NYSE Composite: 14,811.55, +5.1%, -13.7% YTD
Nasdaq: 11,607.62, +7.5%, -25.8% YTD
S&P 500: 3,911.74, +6.4%, -17.9% YTD

Three Red Light Management executives — Van Haze, Haley McLemore and JT Pratt — have launched Otter Creek Entertainment, their own management and strategic partnerships company.

They bring with them their existing talent roster, including artists Roman Alexander, Maddie & Tae and Brett Young.

Haze joined Red Light Management in 2015 and previously served as vp of promotion for MCA Nashville. He also made career stops at Capitol Nashville and Universal South.

McLemore joined Red Light in 2014 and previously spent time at 377 Management and Mercury Nashville. Pratt spent over four years at Red Light and previously worked at L3 Entertainment.

Maddie & Tae, known for their hit singles “Girl in a Country Song” and “Die From a Broken Heart,” just released a new song, “Every Night Every Morning,” from their upcoming album Through The Madness Vol. 2. They also recently wrapped up a run on Young’s The Weekends Tour and will headline the CMT Next Women of Country Tour Presents: All Song No Static Tour beginning in September.

Meanwhile, Young recently took part in a pair of duets, including “Never Til Now” with Ashley Cooke and “For The Good” with Riley Clemmons. His current single, “You Didn’t,” currently ranks at No. 35 on Billboard‘s Country Airplay chart. Alexander has released songs including “Between You & Me,” “Over Me” and “Cocktail Conversations.”

Representatives at Red Light did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Three Red Light Management executives — Van Haze, Haley McLemore and JT Pratt — have launched Otter Creek Entertainment, their own management and strategic partnerships company.

They bring with them their existing talent roster, including artists Roman Alexander, Maddie & Tae and Brett Young.

Haze joined Red Light Management in 2015 and previously served as vp of promotion for MCA Nashville. He also made career stops at Capitol Nashville and Universal South.

McLemore joined Red Light in 2014 and previously spent time at 377 Management and Mercury Nashville. Pratt spent over four years at Red Light and previously worked at L3 Entertainment.

Maddie & Tae, known for their hit singles “Girl in a Country Song” and “Die From a Broken Heart,” just released a new song, “Every Night Every Morning,” from their upcoming album Through The Madness Vol. 2. They also recently wrapped up a run on Young’s The Weekends Tour and will headline the CMT Next Women of Country Tour Presents: All Song No Static Tour beginning in September.

Meanwhile, Young recently took part in a pair of duets, including “Never Til Now” with Ashley Cooke and “For The Good” with Riley Clemmons. His current single, “You Didn’t,” currently ranks at No. 35 on Billboard‘s Country Airplay chart. Alexander has released songs including “Between You & Me,” “Over Me” and “Cocktail Conversations.”

Representatives at Red Light did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Three Red Light Management executives — Van Haze, Haley McLemore and JT Pratt — have launched Otter Creek Entertainment, their own management and strategic partnerships company.

They bring with them their existing talent roster, including artists Roman Alexander, Maddie & Tae and Brett Young.

Haze joined Red Light Management in 2015 and previously served as vp of promotion for MCA Nashville. He also made career stops at Capitol Nashville and Universal South.

McLemore joined Red Light in 2014 and previously spent time at 377 Management and Mercury Nashville. Pratt spent over four years at Red Light and previously worked at L3 Entertainment.

Maddie & Tae, known for their hit singles “Girl in a Country Song” and “Die From a Broken Heart,” just released a new song, “Every Night Every Morning,” from their upcoming album Through The Madness Vol. 2. They also recently wrapped up a run on Young’s The Weekends Tour and will headline the CMT Next Women of Country Tour Presents: All Song No Static Tour beginning in September.

Meanwhile, Young recently took part in a pair of duets, including “Never Til Now” with Ashley Cooke and “For The Good” with Riley Clemmons. His current single, “You Didn’t,” currently ranks at No. 35 on Billboard‘s Country Airplay chart. Alexander has released songs including “Between You & Me,” “Over Me” and “Cocktail Conversations.”

Representatives at Red Light did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Following news that the U.S. Supreme Court officially overturned Roe v. Wade in a 6-3 decision on Friday (June 24), companies including Disney and Chase Bank immediately released statements noting that they would be covering travel expenses for employees who are forced to go out-of-state for abortion care.

While employees in Los Angeles and New York, largely seen as the geographic centers of the music industry, are in no danger of losing access to abortion care given strong state laws providing for it, those residing in states like Tennessee, Florida, Texas and Georgia, among others, are set to face a near-total lack of access through so-called “trigger laws” (as in Tennessee) designed to immediately ban abortion in the event of Roe being overturned by the high court. Others, including Texas and Georgia, already have strict laws limiting access to abortion but could institute further restrictions after being emboldened by Friday’s decision.

In the wake of the news, Billboard reached out to major music companies and organizations to see whether they’ve enacted policies in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision. Below is a roundup of their responses.

Block, Inc./Tidal

Though the parent company of Tidal was already offering travel benefits for U.S. employees in certain states who were forced to travel over 100 miles to receive an abortion, starting July 1 Block will extend those benefits to employees residing anywhere in the U.S. The company says it also offers comprehensive reproductive health services for U.S. employees, including abortion services.

CAA:

CAA, which has a large office in Nashville, already covered abortion expenses under its medical plan for employees. But in May, after the draft SCOTUS ruling leaked, the agency added a provision to cover expenses for relevant travel for any employee who needed to travel to procure an abortion, according to a CAA spokesperson.

Live Nation:

On Friday, Live Nation announced via its social media accounts that the company will cover travel expenses for employees who need access to “women’s healthcare services” outside their home state as well as bail expenses for employees arrested for protesting peacefully. Additionally, the company is partnering with artists to support causes related to the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, including matching Lizzo’s $500,000 donation to Planned Parenthood. Lastly, its Live Nation Women team is “working on initiatives to support voter registration and turnout.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Live Nation Concerts (@livenation)

Sony Music Group:

Prior to the official announcement of the Supreme Court?s decision, Sony Music reaffirmed to employees that the company provides comprehensive care, including reimbursement for travel if required for access to healthcare services, including women?s reproductive healthcare and gender-affirming care.

UTA:

A UTA spokesperson confirmed to Billboard that in May, after a draft of the Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade was leaked, CEO Jeremy Zimmer sent a memo to staff stating that the agency ?will reimburse our colleagues for travel expenses related to receiving women?s reproductive health services that are not accessible in their state of residence.? At the time, the agency also noted that ?in the coming weeks? it would ?be providing educational resources, programming, and opportunities for discussion” on the matter.

Walt Disney Company:

The Mouse House has a large number of employees in Florida, where a 15-week ban on abortion was already slated to go into effect on July 1 (abortions are currently legal up to the 24th week). In an internal memo released Friday, Disney said it has ?processes in place so that an employee who may be unable to access care in one location has affordable coverage for receiving similar levels of care in another location.? In addition to family planning (including ?pregnancy-related decisions?), the benefit covers medical situations related to cancer treatments, transplants and rare disease treatment.

Warner Music Group:

A memo sent by WMG leadership to U.S. employees on Friday obtained by Billboard states that the company believes ?all women have the right to control their reproductive health, and that includes access to health services enabling them to exercise that right, no matter where they live? and is ?committed to taking the appropriate steps to provide practical support to our people who need access to health services,? though no specific policy was announced. The memo also said WMG is supporting the Center For Reproductive Rights and will match employee donations to the organization through July 31.

WME:

A WME spokesperson confirmed that on Friday, the agency provided resources and background on the abortion issue to employees and clients, including an assurance that parent company Endeavor “is committed to ensuring our employees have access to safe and legal reproductive care,” according to documents obtained by Billboard. “We have confirmed that our insurance provider, Aetna, will continue to cover abortions, and the cost of travel for out-of-state care if it is not an option in their home state will not be at the cost of the employee.”

Following news that the U.S. Supreme Court officially overturned Roe v. Wade in a 6-3 decision on Friday (June 24), companies including Disney and Chase Bank immediately released statements noting that they would be covering travel expenses for employees who are forced to go out-of-state for abortion care.

While employees in Los Angeles and New York, largely seen as the geographic centers of the music industry, are in no danger of losing access to abortion care given strong state laws providing for it, those residing in states like Tennessee, Florida, Texas and Georgia, among others, are set to face a near-total lack of access through so-called “trigger laws” (as in Tennessee) designed to immediately ban abortion in the event of Roe being overturned by the high court. Others, including Texas and Georgia, already have strict laws limiting access to abortion but could institute further restrictions after being emboldened by Friday’s decision.

In the wake of the news, Billboard reached out to major music companies and organizations to see whether they’ve enacted policies in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision. Below is a roundup of their responses.

Block, Inc./Tidal

Though the parent company of Tidal was already offering travel benefits for U.S. employees in certain states who were forced to travel over 100 miles to receive an abortion, starting July 1 Block will extend those benefits to employees residing anywhere in the U.S. The company says it also offers comprehensive reproductive health services for U.S. employees, including abortion services.

CAA:

CAA, which has a large office in Nashville, already covered abortion expenses under its medical plan for employees. But in May, after the draft SCOTUS ruling leaked, the agency added a provision to cover expenses for relevant travel for any employee who needed to travel to procure an abortion, according to a CAA spokesperson.

Live Nation:

On Friday, Live Nation announced via its social media accounts that the company will cover travel expenses for employees who need access to “women’s healthcare services” outside their home state as well as bail expenses for employees arrested for protesting peacefully. Additionally, the company is partnering with artists to support causes related to the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, including matching Lizzo’s $500,000 donation to Planned Parenthood. Lastly, its Live Nation Women team is “working on initiatives to support voter registration and turnout.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Live Nation Concerts (@livenation)

Sony Music Group:

Prior to the official announcement of the Supreme Court?s decision, Sony Music reaffirmed to employees that the company provides comprehensive care, including reimbursement for travel if required for access to healthcare services, including women?s reproductive healthcare and gender-affirming care.

UTA:

A UTA spokesperson confirmed to Billboard that in May, after a draft of the Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade was leaked, CEO Jeremy Zimmer sent a memo to staff stating that the agency ?will reimburse our colleagues for travel expenses related to receiving women?s reproductive health services that are not accessible in their state of residence.? At the time, the agency also noted that ?in the coming weeks? it would ?be providing educational resources, programming, and opportunities for discussion” on the matter.

Walt Disney Company:

The Mouse House has a large number of employees in Florida, where a 15-week ban on abortion was already slated to go into effect on July 1 (abortions are currently legal up to the 24th week). In an internal memo released Friday, Disney said it has ?processes in place so that an employee who may be unable to access care in one location has affordable coverage for receiving similar levels of care in another location.? In addition to family planning (including ?pregnancy-related decisions?), the benefit covers medical situations related to cancer treatments, transplants and rare disease treatment.

Warner Music Group:

A memo sent by WMG leadership to U.S. employees on Friday obtained by Billboard states that the company believes ?all women have the right to control their reproductive health, and that includes access to health services enabling them to exercise that right, no matter where they live? and is ?committed to taking the appropriate steps to provide practical support to our people who need access to health services,? though no specific policy was announced. The memo also said WMG is supporting the Center For Reproductive Rights and will match employee donations to the organization through July 31.

WME:

A WME spokesperson confirmed that on Friday, the agency provided resources and background on the abortion issue to employees and clients, including an assurance that parent company Endeavor “is committed to ensuring our employees have access to safe and legal reproductive care,” according to documents obtained by Billboard. “We have confirmed that our insurance provider, Aetna, will continue to cover abortions, and the cost of travel for out-of-state care if it is not an option in their home state will not be at the cost of the employee.”

Following news that the U.S. Supreme Court officially overturned Roe v. Wade in a 6-3 decision on Friday (June 24), companies including Disney and Chase Bank immediately released statements noting that they would be covering travel expenses for employees who are forced to go out-of-state for abortion care.

While employees in Los Angeles and New York, largely seen as the geographic centers of the music industry, are in no danger of losing access to abortion care given strong state laws providing for it, those residing in states like Tennessee, Florida, Texas and Georgia, among others, are set to face a near-total lack of access through so-called “trigger laws” (as in Tennessee) designed to immediately ban abortion in the event of Roe being overturned by the high court. Others, including Texas and Georgia, already have strict laws limiting access to abortion but could institute further restrictions after being emboldened by Friday’s decision.

In the wake of the news, Billboard reached out to major music companies and organizations to see whether they’ve enacted policies in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision. Below is a roundup of their responses.

Block, Inc./Tidal

Though the parent company of Tidal was already offering travel benefits for U.S. employees in certain states who were forced to travel over 100 miles to receive an abortion, starting July 1 Block will extend those benefits to employees residing anywhere in the U.S. The company says it also offers comprehensive reproductive health services for U.S. employees, including abortion services.

CAA:

CAA, which has a large office in Nashville, already covered abortion expenses under its medical plan for employees. But in May, after the draft SCOTUS ruling leaked, the agency added a provision to cover expenses for relevant travel for any employee who needed to travel to procure an abortion, according to a CAA spokesperson.

Live Nation:

On Friday, Live Nation announced via its social media accounts that the company will cover travel expenses for employees who need access to “women’s healthcare services” outside their home state as well as bail expenses for employees arrested for protesting peacefully. Additionally, the company is partnering with artists to support causes related to the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, including matching Lizzo’s $500,000 donation to Planned Parenthood. Lastly, its Live Nation Women team is “working on initiatives to support voter registration and turnout.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Live Nation Concerts (@livenation)

Sony Music Group:

Prior to the official announcement of the Supreme Court?s decision, Sony Music reaffirmed to employees that the company provides comprehensive care, including reimbursement for travel if required for access to healthcare services, including women?s reproductive healthcare and gender-affirming care.

UTA:

A UTA spokesperson confirmed to Billboard that in May, after a draft of the Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade was leaked, CEO Jeremy Zimmer sent a memo to staff stating that the agency ?will reimburse our colleagues for travel expenses related to receiving women?s reproductive health services that are not accessible in their state of residence.? At the time, the agency also noted that ?in the coming weeks? it would ?be providing educational resources, programming, and opportunities for discussion” on the matter.

Walt Disney Company:

The Mouse House has a large number of employees in Florida, where a 15-week ban on abortion was already slated to go into effect on July 1 (abortions are currently legal up to the 24th week). In an internal memo released Friday, Disney said it has ?processes in place so that an employee who may be unable to access care in one location has affordable coverage for receiving similar levels of care in another location.? In addition to family planning (including ?pregnancy-related decisions?), the benefit covers medical situations related to cancer treatments, transplants and rare disease treatment.

Warner Music Group:

A memo sent by WMG leadership to U.S. employees on Friday obtained by Billboard states that the company believes ?all women have the right to control their reproductive health, and that includes access to health services enabling them to exercise that right, no matter where they live? and is ?committed to taking the appropriate steps to provide practical support to our people who need access to health services,? though no specific policy was announced. The memo also said WMG is supporting the Center For Reproductive Rights and will match employee donations to the organization through July 31.

WME:

A WME spokesperson confirmed that on Friday, the agency provided resources and background on the abortion issue to employees and clients, including an assurance that parent company Endeavor “is committed to ensuring our employees have access to safe and legal reproductive care,” according to documents obtained by Billboard. “We have confirmed that our insurance provider, Aetna, will continue to cover abortions, and the cost of travel for out-of-state care if it is not an option in their home state will not be at the cost of the employee.”

Brazilian authorities have stepped up their actions to tackle unlicensed streaming music services, blocking more than 450 infringing music apps that together have generated more than 10 million downloads, according to the Brazilian coordinator of the operation.

Cybercrime police units from 11 states in Brazil, working with U.S. Homeland Security Investigations and the Police IP Crime Unit in London, shut down 461 illegal music downloading apps on Tuesday as part of  the fourth wave of actions by “Operation 404” targeting infringing services on the internet, including sites that illegally broadcast private TV stations, Alesandro Barreto, Operation 404’s coordinator, tells Billboard.

The latest phase of a sweeping anti-piracy operation is ?one of the largest of its kind,? says global recorded music trade body IFPI, which is coordinating the actions with Brazil’s Ministry of Justice and Public Security.

?These actions have seen the highest number of unlicensed music services disrupted as part of the Operation 404 campaign,? Melissa Morgia, IFPI?s Director of Global Content Protection and Enforcement, said in a statement.

Authorities in Brazil have been particularly aggressive in trying to stem the growing problem of digital piracy in the music world, which has been marked by sites that generate reams of fake streams that help artificially inflate the popularity and potential chart position of songs.

IFPI, based in London, has helped to coordinate enforcement actions in other major music markets, including in Germany, where music associations used court injunctions and other legal tactics to shut down at least nine sites in 2020 and 2021. The associations cited competition law to argue that streaming manipulation was fraudulent and deceptive, and unfair to the music business.

Last year, the Center for Investigations of Cyber Crimes in the São Paulo public prosecutor?s office, known in Brazil as Cyber Gaeco, shut down 84 stream-boosting sites as part of Operation Anti-Doping, primarily using cease-and-desist notices and threats of court orders. The sites were shopping fake streams in Brazil, which allowed artists or their representatives to buy bot-generated ?plays? to boost the songs? stream counts. It was the first time that Brazilian authorities had prosecuted fake streams as a crime.

By some accounts, the fake-stream problem is worsening. Two indie label executives that spoke to Billboard said that 2.5% of the ad-supported streams in the global Merlin Network, which handles digital licensing for indie labels and distributors, didn?t qualify as ?fans listening to music they love? in February, and that, the same month, 1.2% of the plays from premium Spotify accounts in the Merlin system were deemed fraudulent. Roc Nation?s distribution arm Equity Nation?s had fraud levels higher than 10% at one point last year, according to one insider. (?Stream manipulation is an industry-wide issue that Spotify takes seriously,? a Spotify spokesperson told Billboard.)

While Brazilian authorities are battling all forms of digital piracy, their latest operation is particularly focused on music infringement.

Since July, when Operation 404 started to work with IFPI, it has taken down more than 500 downloading apps and three illegal streaming sites, Barreto says. (The fourth wave of the operation began in February.)

Barreto says some of the apps had over 1 million users. “We identified that over 350 of the 461 blocked apps were collecting excessive data from these users (social media information, for example),” he says. “The behavior these apps were showing constitutes a privacy violation.”

Some of the apps Brazilian authorities blocked enabled users to download songs by specific artists, including electronic DJ Alok, techno-Forró band Barões da Pisadinha, and sertanejo duo Bruno & Marrone, Barreto says.

?This operation has had a particular impact on the growing problem of unlicensed music apps ? sending a clear message to all operators of such services that they must cease their activities,? Paulo Rosa, the director of Pro-Música Brasil, the labels trade body there, said in IFPI?s statement.

Brazilian authorities have stepped up their actions to tackle unlicensed streaming music services, blocking more than 450 infringing music apps that together have generated more than 10 million downloads, according to the Brazilian coordinator of the operation.

Cybercrime police units from 11 states in Brazil, working with U.S. Homeland Security Investigations and the Police IP Crime Unit in London, shut down 461 illegal music downloading apps on Tuesday as part of  the fourth wave of actions by “Operation 404” targeting infringing services on the internet, including sites that illegally broadcast private TV stations, Alesandro Barreto, Operation 404’s coordinator, tells Billboard.

The latest phase of a sweeping anti-piracy operation is ?one of the largest of its kind,? says global recorded music trade body IFPI, which is coordinating the actions with Brazil’s Ministry of Justice and Public Security.

?These actions have seen the highest number of unlicensed music services disrupted as part of the Operation 404 campaign,? Melissa Morgia, IFPI?s Director of Global Content Protection and Enforcement, said in a statement.

Authorities in Brazil have been particularly aggressive in trying to stem the growing problem of digital piracy in the music world, which has been marked by sites that generate reams of fake streams that help artificially inflate the popularity and potential chart position of songs.

IFPI, based in London, has helped to coordinate enforcement actions in other major music markets, including in Germany, where music associations used court injunctions and other legal tactics to shut down at least nine sites in 2020 and 2021. The associations cited competition law to argue that streaming manipulation was fraudulent and deceptive, and unfair to the music business.

Last year, the Center for Investigations of Cyber Crimes in the São Paulo public prosecutor?s office, known in Brazil as Cyber Gaeco, shut down 84 stream-boosting sites as part of Operation Anti-Doping, primarily using cease-and-desist notices and threats of court orders. The sites were shopping fake streams in Brazil, which allowed artists or their representatives to buy bot-generated ?plays? to boost the songs? stream counts. It was the first time that Brazilian authorities had prosecuted fake streams as a crime.

By some accounts, the fake-stream problem is worsening. Two indie label executives that spoke to Billboard said that 2.5% of the ad-supported streams in the global Merlin Network, which handles digital licensing for indie labels and distributors, didn?t qualify as ?fans listening to music they love? in February, and that, the same month, 1.2% of the plays from premium Spotify accounts in the Merlin system were deemed fraudulent. Roc Nation?s distribution arm Equity Nation?s had fraud levels higher than 10% at one point last year, according to one insider. (?Stream manipulation is an industry-wide issue that Spotify takes seriously,? a Spotify spokesperson told Billboard.)

While Brazilian authorities are battling all forms of digital piracy, their latest operation is particularly focused on music infringement.

Since July, when Operation 404 started to work with IFPI, it has taken down more than 500 downloading apps and three illegal streaming sites, Barreto says. (The fourth wave of the operation began in February.)

Barreto says some of the apps had over 1 million users. “We identified that over 350 of the 461 blocked apps were collecting excessive data from these users (social media information, for example),” he says. “The behavior these apps were showing constitutes a privacy violation.”

Some of the apps Brazilian authorities blocked enabled users to download songs by specific artists, including electronic DJ Alok, techno-Forró band Barões da Pisadinha, and sertanejo duo Bruno & Marrone, Barreto says.

?This operation has had a particular impact on the growing problem of unlicensed music apps ? sending a clear message to all operators of such services that they must cease their activities,? Paulo Rosa, the director of Pro-Música Brasil, the labels trade body there, said in IFPI?s statement.

Brazilian authorities have stepped up their actions to tackle unlicensed streaming music services, blocking more than 450 infringing music apps that together have generated more than 10 million downloads, according to the Brazilian coordinator of the operation.

Cybercrime police units from 11 states in Brazil, working with U.S. Homeland Security Investigations and the Police IP Crime Unit in London, shut down 461 illegal music downloading apps on Tuesday as part of  the fourth wave of actions by “Operation 404” targeting infringing services on the internet, including sites that illegally broadcast private TV stations, Alesandro Barreto, Operation 404’s coordinator, tells Billboard.

The latest phase of a sweeping anti-piracy operation is ?one of the largest of its kind,? says global recorded music trade body IFPI, which is coordinating the actions with Brazil’s Ministry of Justice and Public Security.

?These actions have seen the highest number of unlicensed music services disrupted as part of the Operation 404 campaign,? Melissa Morgia, IFPI?s Director of Global Content Protection and Enforcement, said in a statement.

Authorities in Brazil have been particularly aggressive in trying to stem the growing problem of digital piracy in the music world, which has been marked by sites that generate reams of fake streams that help artificially inflate the popularity and potential chart position of songs.

IFPI, based in London, has helped to coordinate enforcement actions in other major music markets, including in Germany, where music associations used court injunctions and other legal tactics to shut down at least nine sites in 2020 and 2021. The associations cited competition law to argue that streaming manipulation was fraudulent and deceptive, and unfair to the music business.

Last year, the Center for Investigations of Cyber Crimes in the São Paulo public prosecutor?s office, known in Brazil as Cyber Gaeco, shut down 84 stream-boosting sites as part of Operation Anti-Doping, primarily using cease-and-desist notices and threats of court orders. The sites were shopping fake streams in Brazil, which allowed artists or their representatives to buy bot-generated ?plays? to boost the songs? stream counts. It was the first time that Brazilian authorities had prosecuted fake streams as a crime.

By some accounts, the fake-stream problem is worsening. Two indie label executives that spoke to Billboard said that 2.5% of the ad-supported streams in the global Merlin Network, which handles digital licensing for indie labels and distributors, didn?t qualify as ?fans listening to music they love? in February, and that, the same month, 1.2% of the plays from premium Spotify accounts in the Merlin system were deemed fraudulent. Roc Nation?s distribution arm Equity Nation?s had fraud levels higher than 10% at one point last year, according to one insider. (?Stream manipulation is an industry-wide issue that Spotify takes seriously,? a Spotify spokesperson told Billboard.)

While Brazilian authorities are battling all forms of digital piracy, their latest operation is particularly focused on music infringement.

Since July, when Operation 404 started to work with IFPI, it has taken down more than 500 downloading apps and three illegal streaming sites, Barreto says. (The fourth wave of the operation began in February.)

Barreto says some of the apps had over 1 million users. “We identified that over 350 of the 461 blocked apps were collecting excessive data from these users (social media information, for example),” he says. “The behavior these apps were showing constitutes a privacy violation.”

Some of the apps Brazilian authorities blocked enabled users to download songs by specific artists, including electronic DJ Alok, techno-Forró band Barões da Pisadinha, and sertanejo duo Bruno & Marrone, Barreto says.

?This operation has had a particular impact on the growing problem of unlicensed music apps ? sending a clear message to all operators of such services that they must cease their activities,? Paulo Rosa, the director of Pro-Música Brasil, the labels trade body there, said in IFPI?s statement.

Pensado’s Place, a podcast and YouTube series hosted by Grammy-winning recording engineer Dave Pensado and music mogul Herb Trawick, has signed with Red Light Management to expand its footprint through distribution, live events and brand partnerships.

Pensado, who worked with a wide spectrum of artists, including Mariah Carey, Mary J. Blige, T-Pain, Beyoncé and Peaches, and Trawick, a former artist manager and label consultant, discuss the finer points of audio mixing and engineering as well as other aspects of the creative process. They have recorded more than 500 episodes, with such guests as  Keith Urban, Jack Antonoff, producer Dave Cobb and engineer Lola Romero, and are available in more than 190 countries. The Pensado’s Place YouTube channel has amassed 274,000 subscribers and racked up more than 25 million views on the platform — 8 million annually, according to the signing announcement. Pensado and Trawick, who is also the show’s creator and executive producer, have additionally expanded the brand into the live-event business and established an awards show.

The duo was signed by Red Light’s chief strategy officer Bruce Flohr.

“I have always respected Herb and Dave and their ability to tell the creators’ story to a global audience,” said Flohr. “We look forward to helping their audience grow and help redefine what a music series can be in todays modern music world.”

“A partner for us required multi-pronged expertise, passion and a deep understanding of what we’ve built said Trawick. “There’s none better than Bruce Flohr and Red Light. Bruce’s world-class knowledge in branding, distribution and live events, plus our mutual interest in web3 and education rang the bell immediately for me.”

Pensado’s Place, a podcast and YouTube series hosted by Grammy-winning recording engineer Dave Pensado and music mogul Herb Trawick, has signed with Red Light Management to expand its footprint through distribution, live events and brand partnerships.

Pensado, who worked with a wide spectrum of artists, including Mariah Carey, Mary J. Blige, T-Pain, Beyoncé and Peaches, and Trawick, a former artist manager and label consultant, discuss the finer points of audio mixing and engineering as well as other aspects of the creative process. They have recorded more than 500 episodes, with such guests as  Keith Urban, Jack Antonoff, producer Dave Cobb and engineer Lola Romero, and are available in more than 190 countries. The Pensado’s Place YouTube channel has amassed 274,000 subscribers and racked up more than 25 million views on the platform — 8 million annually, according to the signing announcement. Pensado and Trawick, who is also the show’s creator and executive producer, have additionally expanded the brand into the live-event business and established an awards show.

The duo was signed by Red Light’s chief strategy officer Bruce Flohr.

“I have always respected Herb and Dave and their ability to tell the creators’ story to a global audience,” said Flohr. “We look forward to helping their audience grow and help redefine what a music series can be in todays modern music world.”

“A partner for us required multi-pronged expertise, passion and a deep understanding of what we’ve built said Trawick. “There’s none better than Bruce Flohr and Red Light. Bruce’s world-class knowledge in branding, distribution and live events, plus our mutual interest in web3 and education rang the bell immediately for me.”

Pensado’s Place, a podcast and YouTube series hosted by Grammy-winning recording engineer Dave Pensado and music mogul Herb Trawick, has signed with Red Light Management to expand its footprint through distribution, live events and brand partnerships.

Pensado, who worked with a wide spectrum of artists, including Mariah Carey, Mary J. Blige, T-Pain, Beyoncé and Peaches, and Trawick, a former artist manager and label consultant, discuss the finer points of audio mixing and engineering as well as other aspects of the creative process. They have recorded more than 500 episodes, with such guests as  Keith Urban, Jack Antonoff, producer Dave Cobb and engineer Lola Romero, and are available in more than 190 countries. The Pensado’s Place YouTube channel has amassed 274,000 subscribers and racked up more than 25 million views on the platform — 8 million annually, according to the signing announcement. Pensado and Trawick, who is also the show’s creator and executive producer, have additionally expanded the brand into the live-event business and established an awards show.

The duo was signed by Red Light’s chief strategy officer Bruce Flohr.

“I have always respected Herb and Dave and their ability to tell the creators’ story to a global audience,” said Flohr. “We look forward to helping their audience grow and help redefine what a music series can be in todays modern music world.”

“A partner for us required multi-pronged expertise, passion and a deep understanding of what we’ve built said Trawick. “There’s none better than Bruce Flohr and Red Light. Bruce’s world-class knowledge in branding, distribution and live events, plus our mutual interest in web3 and education rang the bell immediately for me.”

Suter told the kids he’s excited to see them start recycling, composting, reducing and reusing.

“I just want to encourage you to be ambassadors for change, be people who want to go out and make the world a better place and do everything in your life as a selfless act and try to maybe make future generations have a planet that’s very healthy,” he said.

The ?Waste-Free Crew” program hits home for Suter, who has an environmental science degree from Harvard.

Environmental issues have been on Suter’s heart “in a big way” since 2006 after seeing the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” which follows Al Gore’s campaign to raise awareness of global warming. Suter said it “smacked me upside the head” and motivated him to make a difference.

Suter doesn’t buy paper towels or napkins, frequents farmers markets to buy food that hasn’t been packaged, has a garden in his basement and has volunteered for cleanup projects, according to a 2020 Journal Sentinel report. He’s also worked with Nature Conservancy, Players for the Planet and EcoAthletes.

SC Johnson, the Brewers and Suter have also launched the Brewers Sustainability Council, an advisory board to review, discuss and implement best sustainability practices at the ballpark, a news release said.

For the second year, SC Johnson is turning plastic cups used at the ballpark into packaging for Scrubbing Bubbles, VanderMolen said.

Contact Hannah Kirby at hannah.kirby@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter at @HannahHopeKirby.

View the original story here.

Debuting at DRV PNK Stadium, Reverse Vending Machines Will Make Stadium Recycling More Efficient and Rewarding for Fans

HEINEKEN USA and Inter Miami CF in collaboration with Cycle, a recycling technology and data company founded by University of Miami alumni, launched a new recycling program at DRV PNK Stadium. Leveraging innovative technology to improve recycling efforts at stadium sporting events, Inter Miami fans can now find Heineken® branded Reverse Vending Machines (RVMs) throughout the stadium where they can recycle their empty beverage containers and win rewards in return.

The machines are designed to engage fans and incentivize recycling efforts in a moment where many people may not have enough opportunities to recycle their products during an event. The process for the fans is simple: insert empty beverage containers at the machines, and scan a QR code to get a unique transaction ID. Once information is entered into the web app, users find out instantly if they are a winner and are given instructions for how to redeem their prize. The initiative will be promoted on the stadium?s videoboard and through PA announcements and Inter Miami fans will be able to win a variety of items including Heineken® 0.0, fan merchandise and exclusive access to stadium promotions, and even Inter Miami CF jerseys throughout the season.

The four RVMs are in the following locations throughout the stadium: two machines next to the Heineken Bar on the North side, one machines near section 120/121 (East side) and one machine near section 104/105 (West side).

The launch of this initiative supports HEINEKEN?s Brew a Better World ambitions aimed at creating a positive impact on the environment, social sustainability, and the responsible consumption of alcohol. These commitments build upon the progress the company has made since its initial launch in 2009.

?Through our efforts over the past decade with Brew a Better World, we have found that the best way to help consumers make sustainable choices is creating convenient opportunities that fit into real moments,? said Josephine Bertrams, SVP and Chief Corporate Affairs Officer of HEINEKEN USA. ?By meeting our consumers in more of these moments, this initiative seeks to eliminate the barriers fans may face at sporting events by encouraging and making it easier to make the responsible choice to recycle. As a passionate leader in supporting live events HEINEKEN USA is thrilled to be making sustainability more accessible and exciting for consumers with Cycle and Inter Miami.?

?Working with HEINEKEN USA and Cycle to make it easier for our fans to recycle at Inter Miami CF matches is a very important initiative for our club,? said Inter Miami VP of Marketing, Community and Fan Engagement, Chris Allan. ?Through research and listening to our supporters, we learned sustainability is particularly important to our fan base and we want to do the best we can to ensure our fans have the resources to put the environment first when they are enjoying fútbol matches at DRV PNK Stadium.?

?Sports stadiums are an important part of American culture and represent a unique opportunity to educate and incentivize people to participate in the circular economy. The Cycle team is honored to be collaborating with HEINEKEN USA and Inter Miami CF to launch this first-of-its-kind stadium recycling program,? said Anwar Khan, co-founder of Cycle.

?We want to make recycling collections more efficient while rewarding fans for their sustainable behavior, and our CTO, Harrison Mount, worked hard in conjunction with FanUp.io to make sure that process is simple, fast, and fun for the fans,? added Connor Pohl, co-founder of Cycle.

Globally, as an important part of the HEINEKEN?s EverGreen balanced growth strategy, HEINEKEN remains committed to a path to net zero emissions and is working toward achieving zero waste by 2025. HEINEKEN aims to reduce its carbon footprint through an effort to cut overall emissions 30% by 2030 and decarbonize its full value chain by 2040. For more information on Brew a Better World 2030, click here.

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