Cristina Perpiñá-Robert (Barcelona, 1969) directs the General Society of Authors and Editors (SGAE), an institution that seems to have put the scandals at bay, which have not left the modernist palace that houses its headquarters in the center of Madrid since In 2011, Teddy Bautista was arrested for alleged embezzlement of funds. The former president of the entity, acquitted ten years later, inaugurated a decade of shocks that made society an unattractive place to build a career. Since the musician’s resignation, at least six presidents have paraded (some even lasted three months) through the corridors of Longoria’s palace, not counting the two interim ones. And many other general directors.
The last: Perpiñá-Robert, who is now celebrating one year in office at the copyright management company chaired by Antonio Onetti since 2020, the longest period of peace known since 2011. Only a woman who considers herself part of the house (he worked at the SGAE between 1998 and 2018) could take over this position poisoned. “I knew that it is not the most stable place in the world,” he admits, “but many issues had already been addressed and we needed to leave behind what the entity has suffered and start a new stage.”
And this new stage that, in principle, was going to consist of the entity’s digital transformation project, turned into a return to the basics. And the thing is that “society had deviated from what the business of a management entity is, which is to collect and distribute,” he points out. Hence, the board dedicated itself to adjusting rates to the ministerial order that was published when it joined the SGAE, to providing clarity to the rate framework and to signing peace with users, he explains: “We have had many years of conflicts with television stations. and we have to achieve a stable and cordial relationship because they are our main clients.”
The first year of the general director of the SGAE has been more about “putting out fires” than designing a strategic plan, she acknowledges. “There have been many very urgent issues to resolve.” How to execute the judicial sentence of one of the derivatives of what is known as wheel case (64 million euros given to 40,000 authors for music broadcast on television between 2015 and 2018, which the courts annulled last August, to force in the second instance to redo only the distribution corresponding to the year 2015), the cost of which was assumed by the organization in accordance with its recommendation “so as not to reopen the wound in the wheel, which had already closed.”
Now the institution is negotiating with television and broadcasting entities to achieve a stable situation, says Perpiñá-Robert: “We have to leave behind so many conflicts, the numerous lawsuits that we have had, which are exhausting for both users and management entities. In the end we have to live together: they are our maximum users of repertoire and our authors live from the collection of rights from these users.”
This leads to the next open battle that has occupied her since she became the director of the SGAE. The National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC) accused the company in 2022 of abuse of a dominant position in the application of its rates to radio and television stations (a situation that is repeated in different courts). Of course, the board does not think that its rates are anti-competitive and wanted to have explained this to the Competition authorities, with whom it intended to reach an agreement. But he points out: “They haven’t even received us.”
Perpiñá-Robert expects a fine. She is upset because she “finds it surprising that the CNMC insists on intervening when all parties involved are working to reach an agreement.” “We have reached agreements with SEDA, also with DAMA, we are close with the television networks… It would be a shame if the CNMC did not see that the sector has solved the problems and wants an agreed solution.” Regarding the fine, the board assures that they will appeal it as they already did with another of almost three million euros that last January the National Court ruled in favor of the copyright management company in Spain.
“What the SGAE has to do is work,” the executive says again and again. That is the way, in her opinion, to recover the reputation lost after so many brawls. “Work well, have a stable tariff framework, good agreements with users and be as transparent and fast as possible in the collection and distribution of royalties for authors,” she lists.
Recently appointed vice president of BIEM (international society of mechanical reproduction rights), the director points out that the SGAE is beginning to be an important interlocutor in Europe (“where it is interesting how we handle conflicts with some operators”). The collection figures are consistent: the 349.1 million euros received in 2023 by the entity represent the highest amount reached since 2007, although they represent only a slight increase compared to the 348.9 million in 2022. What it has experienced A notable growth, of 11.9%, is the distribution of copyrights between partners and administrators: in total 354.1 million euros (the amount is higher than the collection because it includes some income from other years received more late). The same as the number of people and companies that have received these rights: it has increased by 25.5% to 83,148.
Those who raise the most
Although the works that raise the most money continue to be the Aranjuez’s concert by Joaquín Rodrigo and Macarena of Los del Río, in the last three years the authors who dispute the first positions in the ranking of copyright collection are Alejandro Sanz, Joaquín Sabina, Joan Manuel Serrat, Manuel Carrasco, Juan Luis Guerra and Pablo Alborán, although more and more urban musicians are moving up the list, this is the case of Quevedo or Saiko in the last year thanks to the digital boom and live concerts (for which they receive 8% of the box office). These latter musicians are contributing to lowering the average age of SGAE members.
Perpiñá-Robert does not expect the peak collections of the golden age of copyright with records to be repeated, before the digital explosion and the streaming, but she is satisfied because for the first time international revenues have exceeded 30 million euros, digital revenue has also been a record, and that of live concerts has been maintained. The Spanish consumer is very particular, he explains, just as they do not spend on buying digital music, they do spend significant amounts to attend concerts, these shows have become the third source of income for the society of authors, with 15.8 % of the total, ahead of digital, which weighs 13.8%, “although in other countries it is the first source of income.” Televisions and radios are the main payers to the SGAE (26.4%) and nightclubs and bars are the second (19.4%).
Today. Because the future riddled with generative artificial intelligence is a serious threat to authors and their intellectual property. A context in which the SGAE works on regulations at the European level so that copyright is respected: creators must authorize the use of their work and must be compensated for it, maintains the executive, who believes that they must also be protected. works generated by machines to prevent there from being a parallel market that could displace creators. “There is concern.” “We have to look for a sustainable model,” says the leader of the ninth copyright management entity in the world by revenue, according to the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC), which groups 228 entities from 119 countries.