Harry Fox Posts Big Numbers

Leading U.S. music rights licensing organization Harry Fox Agency announced that they brought in $394.5 million for total royalty collections in 2007, a nearly 4 percent increase from the previous year’s numbers. Representing around 35,000 publishers and a catalog of roughly 1.9 million songs available for licensing, HFA’s solid royalty figure stems from over 1.51 million mechanical licenses issued last year.

Leading U.S. music rights licensing organization Harry Fox Agency announced that they brought in $394.5 million for total royalty collections in 2007, a nearly 4 percent increase from the previous year’s numbers. Representing around 35,000 publishers and a catalog of roughly 1.9 million songs available for licensing, HFA’s solid royalty figure stems from over 1.51 million mechanical licenses issued last year.

Some believe the number is surprisingly high given the downward spiral of CD-based mechanicals, but the report issued by HFA on Monday stated that 82 percent of the nearly 1.52 million licenses issued in 2007 were for digital formats. This includes permanent digital downloads, limited downloads, and interactive streams, although the company is currently in a battle with online music retailers concerning the classification of on-demand streams as a mechanical delivery.

“In the context of a declining market for CDs, HFA’s continued positive performance validates our efforts over the past several years to upgrade our technology and business…” said HFA President and CEO Gary Churgin. “Our licensing arrangements for tablature with MusicNotes, the collaboration agreement with AudibleMagic, and other new offers reflect our sustained effort to bring more valuable opportunities to the publishing market.”