Summus is a Latin word that describes the greatness of things. In our case, SUMMUS is a summit to celebrate the greatness of music. A place where experts from all around the music industry meet to share lessons learnt, build consensus about today's challenges, and design forthcoming landscapes.
Flowers by Bornay, Carrer de Melcior de Palau, 36, 08028 Barcelona
Flowers by Bornay, Carrer de Melcior de Palau, 36, 08028 Barcelona
The times they are a-changing, and the geopolitics of music copyright and technology are no exception. Just to name a few turns, traditional hubs splinter, new brotherhoods surface, copyright organisations acquire companies, tech companies play licensing, and transcontinental mandates and global licensing go side-by-side. The panel aims to understand the inner strategies driving these changes and their implications for songwriters, artists, and the music industry at large.
There are more than ever opportunities for artists to be discovered and reach new audiences. In-store playlists, background music services, music in gaming, live streaming and virtual spaces can act as unexpected gateways for fans to discover new music. But let’s go beyond the playlist. Music is ubiquitous, audiences are happy, but are artists? Is the music industry successfully monetising the use of music in public performances? Traditional licensing models face unique challenges when applied to virtual environments. With the rise of virtual reality performances and the metaverse, is it time to rethink how music rights are managed? And what about accurate royalties distribution -technology plays a crucial role, but is that all it takes? Let’s delve into these critical questions and explore the future of music discovery and monetisation in a rapidly evolving landscape.
As traditional linear television becomes more viewer-centric and increasingly adopts the characteristics of a content-on-demand platform, the lines between conventional broadcasting and Subscription Video On Demand (SVOD) services blur, creating a complex landscape for music copyright and licensing. Our panel seeks to unravel the evolving dynamics of music rights in this transitional phase, looking at how it impacts licensing models, advertisements, and the role of cue sheets.
Take a glimpse into the future of digital music services six years from now. This discussion will offer a series of predictions on the impact of artificial intelligence on music creation and curation, the role of video synchronisation in enhancing musical experiences, the evolving dynamics between artists and fans, the surge in content availability, the significance of user-centric models, and the potential regulatory and copyright challenges that may emerge. Join us for a forward-looking conversation on the innovations set to shape the landscape of music services and the opportunities and challenges that await.
AI companies are launching generative music services with typically little and sometimes contradictory information about which data was used to train the models. Two approaches emerge against the training data uncertainty. One is certification, where the companies expose their data to third-party copyright scrutiny. Interrogation is the other, where reverse engineering principles are applied to understand if a specific repertoire was used to train the model. We’ll get chatty about how these methods aim to increase transparency and mitigate copyright risks.
Recently, major DSPs announced they would no longer pay royalties for over-claimed works. This policy shift led to changes in claiming practices and spurred cooperation between rights holders to avoid revenue withholding. This raises important questions about conflict management: How are conflicts initially detected and notified? How are they resolved? How do parties ensure conflict resolutions remain effective? Is conflict resolution worth the effort? The panel will address these and more conflicting questions.
A music industry professional for over 30 years, Neil has held executive roles in major organizations like EMI Music Publishing, Right Thinking Solutions – a music industry consultancy, ASCAP, and Universal Music Group. Over the years, Neil has served on the Executive Boards of SABAM, IMPA, ICMP, the Global Repertoire Database (“GRD”) and the Repertoire Data Exchange (“RDx”). His expertise lies in rights, royalty, and repertoire management, where he has consistently focused on improving business processes and transparency to increase revenue for creators and rights holders. He is currently on sabbatical, applying his business skills to his garden.
Across nearly 20 years of providing legal advice in the music and wider entertainment sector, Peter has acted for major and indie labels and publishers, trade unions, collecting societies, streamers, broadcasters, video games developers, international trade bodies and leading technology service providers to the music sector. With particular expertise in collective licensing, technology and data, and having worked extensively in both private practice and in-house, Peter is uniquely well positioned to see all sides of the music distribution and music royalty landscape both legally and commercially. Peter’s current position with leading UK law firm, Wiggin, involves negotiating music licences for music streamers and SVOD platforms across EMEA and beyond, as well as advising numerous music industry clients on new and emerging copyright law, governance, regulatory compliance, data transfers, royalty allocation, disputes and much more.
Dominic has over 30 years of experience in business and legal affairs in the music and entertainment industries. He is a highly respected executive with a unique portfolio of knowledge spanning the globe and deep experience in building and leading teams. He has worked with some of the biggest media services in the world, including Netflix, CBS, AOL, Time Warner and Viacom. At Netflix, Dominic was the Vice President, Music. He was responsible for building and leading the global music business and legal affairs function, taking it from zero personnel in 2013 to around 80 in 2024. This encompassed each part of the value chain, from production, marketing, and distribution, together with the underlying business processes that supported this work at scale across the world. He set strategy, managed key external relationships in the music industry and public policy arena, and was responsible internally to the C-Suite for the overall music expense.
With a background in economics and a foundation as a songwriter for BMG Rights Management, Michael's career spans impactful contributions. During his tenure as VP of Strategy at SoundCloud, he orchestrated the launch of an acclaimed new streaming model, earning acclaim for his global business strategy and innovative fan-powered initiatives. As the Chief Strategy & Impact Officer at Voice-Swap.ai, he shapes the company's vision and strategy, overseeing partnerships, business development, and innovation alignment with social responsibility goals. Concurrently, as a principal advisor at Forms + Shapes, Michael continues to influence the music landscape, collaborating on AI, creator tools, fan engagement models, and administrative technologies.
Matteo Fedeli, born in 1984, has been appointed as SIAE’s CEO in January 2023. Graduated with honors in management engineering, he declares himself a 360-degree tech enthusiast and an ambassador of customers’ needs, strongly convinced that success can be lasting only if pursued through a customer-centric approach but always supported by a quantitative scientific method. He joined SIAE in 2014, as director of the Music Division, immediately contributing to the digital transformation of the Society within a constantly evolving market. Prior to that, he gained strong management consulting expertise at Bain&Company, focusing on corporate transformation, post-merger integration and reorganization strategies.
Sara is a technology innovation leader and music engineer with over 10 years of international experience. Currently, she works as Head of Music Label Partner Eng, EMEA, APAC & LATAM at YouTube, where she and her team deal with record labels from a technical perspective. Previously, Sara worked at the BBC as innovation lead for the music and radio team. Always linked to the union between music and technology, lately working closely with the latest AI developments.
Roser holds a degree in Telecommunication Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia. Currently, she is a predoctoral researcher in the Music Technology Group (MTG) of Pompeu Fabra University, specializing in the algorithmic transparency of generative music models, as well as studying the principal ethical implications of these algorithms. The project is developed within a collaborative and interdisciplinary framework involving the MTG, the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission and Sony AI.
Julien Lefebvre is head of Digital Strategy and Innovation at SACEM, the French Author Rights Company. After ten years consulting in IT architecture, Julien joined SACEM in 2016 as chief enterprise architect. Since then, he and his team have been involved in the IT strategy and in all the major business and technological transformations: online processing, lives, repertoire management, customer and members relationship management and international collaboration. Since the end of 2019, Julien is also in charge of SacemLab, the Sacem innovation team. In this new role, he works closely with the music tech ecosystem and especially with startups, to identify and leverage opportunities to bring value to the members and customers.
Richard works on different music industry and metadata initiatives, including the operation of the ISRC Registration Authority. He also delivers technology leadership and advice on a wide range of policy issues. He has recently worked closely with two projects in the performance rights area: Repertoire Data Exchange (RDx), a hub for the exchange of recording and rights data using the DDEX RDR standard; and SoundSys, a cloud-based back-office system for Music Licensing Companies which uses DDEX RDR and other data in calculating the distribution of performance rights revenues.
Jordi Pons is a researcher at Stability AI working on generative models for audio and music. Previously, he was a staff researcher at Dolby Laboratories and received a PhD in music technology, large-scale audio collections, and deep learning at the Music Technology Group (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona). He also received a MSc in sound and music computing (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona), and his BSc was in telecommunications engineering (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Barcelona). He also interned at IRCAM (Paris), at the German Hearing Center (Hannover), at Pandora Radio (USA, Bay Area), and at Telefónica Research (Barcelona).
John’s background is steeped in music. He started studying violin and piano as a child and went on to play in symphony orchestras professionally. He sits on a number of boards and was again named in Billboard magazine’s International Power Players list in 2024.
As its Director of Global Legal Policy, Abbas coordinates IFPI’s work to secure effective legal protection in all music markets and promote the role of copyright in supporting investment in music and the licensing of digital music services. With particular expertise in new technologies and copyright law, Abbas has a key role in informing IFPI’s voice in shaping legal and policy discussions concerning copyright and artificial intelligence. Before joining IFPI in 2020, Abbas worked in the intellectual property department of the international law firm Bird & Bird, advising clients across the music, entertainment and tech industries on infringement and licensing issues relating to the use of content by digital services.
Nans, originally from the South of France, has lived in Paris since 2000. Graduated in Political Sciences and Law, with more than 20 years in the musical industry, Nans is currently responsible for conflict management at SACEM. Prior to this, he was an artist’s manager, then spent 15 years at Warner as responsible for copyright and income tracking. Nans is co-chairing the TOWGE.
Robin manages all operational elements of the AMRA business—the world’s first global digital music collection society—alongside supporting licensing and commercial activities. In 2022, he held a leading role in the sale of AMRA to Francisco Partners and has overseen annual collections increasing to over $150m since he joined in 2019. Davies is part of the Group executive team and is responsible for achieving key objectives such as end-to-end cloud processing, increasing global licensing coverage, and supporting songwriter causes through industry board positions.
Jakue Lopez is currently the Manager of Partner Engineering, Music Publishing for EMEA at YouTube Music. He and his team help build solutions so that Collective Management Organizations (CMOs), music publishers and songwriters get compensated for their music usage on YouTube. He has over 10 years of experience in the online publishing royalty distribution processes, where he keeps finding ways to bridge the gap and impact in his two passions - Music and Technology.
SUMMUS is an event organized by BMAT
It will be held on 25th & 26th September at Flowers by Bornay and BMAT HQ.