You may have heard of only one of these companies, or maybe you have n’t heard of it, but this can be a big deal in the field of music rights licensing, not to mention royalties for artists and songwriters: Los Angeles-based Pex acquires Dubset Media Holdings. Acquisitions worth more than $ 25 million.

What is Pex? Originally established in 2014, the technology can monitor social networks around the world and platforms that rely on UGC content to eliminate music and movie content belonging to rights holders. Pex proudly states that it can "find code segments as short as 1 second on dozens of platforms worldwide."

Pex To date, the company has processed 6 billion hours of audio and video data-representing more than 20 billion videos and songs-and has been discovered / tracked on platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, VK, Vimeo, Twitch and Twitter.

Once you find the purpose of the content, TechCrunch According to reports, Pex allows its industry partners to request withdrawals, track consumption data and / or actually negotiate license agreements (ie get paid) with the platform.

It can even find cover versions of songs, as well as identify modified versions of tracks (see: Some YouTube upload programs try to evade detection by slowing down or speeding up content).

"The scale and speed of our technology gives all rights owners extensive access to our rights management and analysis services, which are built on an index database of 20 billion video and audio files. We believe this will prove to be a game changer The combination."

Pex said it has partnered with "main music and movie rights holders" and recently launched a new chain of its business model: Attribution engine.

The company said that the engine could be "plugged in" through technology platforms such as the next TikTok, which was unable to obtain YouTube-like UGC licenses from the main rights holders. Pex said the attribution engine then "identifies, licenses, and manages royalties for the content."

So, no wonder Pex is now likened to "Independent YouTube Content ID".

Needless to say, Article 17 (formerly known as Article 13), which will soon be implemented in Europe, could quickly raise Pex's position in the music industry.

As a reminder, Article 13/17 will make the platform legally responsible for copyright infringement of its services by users.

Article 17 is part of the new European Copyright Directive and now looks like it Will not become British law after Brexit, But must be implemented in EU member states by June 21, 2021.

What is Dubset? MBW has written several books before, this is a San Francisco-based startup.

Dubset is dedicated to ensuring that uploaded "unofficial" remixes and DJ sets (often containing multiple samples and stems) can obtain copyright licenses for streaming media and ensure that subsequent royalties are paid to the right people.

In the past, Dubset and Spotify with Sound cloudAnd at the same time as Sony Music with Warner Music Group.

According to TechCrunchPex acquired Dubset for between $ 25 million and $ 50 million.

According to a press release announcing the transaction: "Rightholders using the Dubset Rights Management Platform to distribute music on major streaming services can now access their catalog for use in any audio and video content on social media and user-generated content platforms and which performed. "

"This acquisition will immediately expand rights holders' ability to locate, protect and monetize their use of the catalog in any form of music or video shared on the world's largest UGC and social media sites."

Rasty Turek, founder and CEO of Pex, said, "Dubset is a company that we are very interested in." "In the music industry, few companies have been able to obtain catalog licenses as successfully as Dubset, and their music copyright database is very Large and rare.

"The scale and speed of our technology gives all rights owners extensive access to our rights management and analysis services, which are built on an index database of 20 billion video and audio files. We believe this will prove to be a game changer The combination."

Former Dubset Bob Barbiere is now Senior Vice President of Digital Rights at Pex. "The distribution of digital media via social media has exceeded the ability of copyright owners to track, license and manage their audio and video assets. Dubset has successfully and promptly met the identification and licensing of remixes and music in remixes," he said. Industry needs. "

Summarizing the transaction, Barbiere said: "This acquisition will immediately expand the rights holder's ability to locate, protect and monetize its use of the catalog in any form of music or video currently shared on the world's largest UGC and social media sites ability."

Pex's parent company, Los Angeles-based Pexesco Inc, $ 7 million in seed funding raised in 2017 From Illuminate Ventures and Susa Ventures.