Reports

On 3rd September, 2019, the Indian Music Industry (“IMI”) hosted the 2nd edition of Dialogue: The Indian Music Convention 2019 in New Delhi. The national conclave saw participation from key stakeholders in the music ecosystem including representatives from the recorded music companies, copyright societies, industry partners (DSPs), as well as representatives from IFPI, think tanks and diplomatic missions. The DPIIT and Copyright Office continued to show their support for the increased engagement between these stakeholders, through their participation at the event.

At Dialogue, IMI along with Deloitte today jointly launched “Economic impact of the recorded music industry in India”. Ms Sumita Dawra, Joint Secretary, DPIIT, unveiled the report along with Mr Vikram Mehra, Chairman, IMI.

“Vision 2022: Roadmap for India to reach the top ten music markets in the globe” per IFPI metrics was the mission statement of Dialogue 2018 and I am pleased to say that we are on course to achieve our objective. India jumped to 15th place in the IFPI global rankings in 2019 from 19th in 2018. For the 3rd year in a row IMI members have recorded an average of 20% growth rate for the past three years. Today we are at US$ 156.1 mn and are currently around US$ 143 mn away from reaching the 10th spot. Some of the low hanging fruits are:

Sync Revenues:
With digital advertising growing at 33.35 % and the total pie at approximately US$ 2.64 bn or INR 169 bn in India, the increase in advertising spend is an opportunity for our members and IMI is working at various levels and forums to evangelize the effective and economic use of sync licenses with the advertising fraternity (brands, associations etc.) and the advertisers.

Driving traffic to legitimate sites is another key focus area:
As per the IFPI – IMI Digital Music Study 2019, research indicates 67% consumers still visit pirated websites for their music needs. We commend the efforts of CIPAM, MCDCU and IMI continues to support these efforts. IMI has welcomed the Dynamic Site Blocking ruling of the Delhi High Court. Piracy is like cancer needing both chemotherapy and palliative care. The focus has been on chemotherapy and the industry will maintain those levels but will also increase our efforts on palliative care and work together with the all the stakeholders, the DSP’s, telcos and the creative industries in driving traffic to legitimate sites.

Lastly, Brazil earned US$ 77.4 mn in Public Performance revenues when compared to US$ 14.7 mn earned by India, we are hopeful that PPL will be granted society status soon and that will help us grow this revenue stream.

The recorded music industry in India embodies and has many touch points with our Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s vision to name a few, #STARTUPINDIA #DIGITALINDIA #MSMEINDIA #INVESTINDIA.

We live in interesting and challenging times.

A joint report of both of the events can be downloaded here