Nick Mason and David Gilmour performing live. Photo Credit: anyonlinyr
Last week, reports suggested that BMG and Warner Music Group were vying to purchase the catalog of Pink Floyd. Now, the companies are facing another competing bid, for Iver Heath-based One Media iP has made an offer for a portion of the song rights.
Berlin-headquartered BMG and the publicly traded Warner Music Group have yet to comment on their reported efforts to acquire the catalog of Pink Floyd – nor has the nearly six-decade-old group addressed the matter. But according to anonymous sources with knowledge of the talks, the winning bidder could spend over $500 million on the body of work.
The sum would rival that which Bruce Springsteen reportedly received from Sony Music Entertainment for his own catalog in December of 2021. Other legacy artists, including but certainly not limited to Sting, Paul Simon, Fleetwood Mac, ZZ Top, and America, have likewise cashed in on their catalogs since the corresponding sales rush initiated in 2020.
On the heels of these high-profile deals and a more recent collection of smaller-scale transactions, however, some have expressed the belief that the red-hot catalog space could finally be cooling down.
In any event, at least one more blockbuster agreement appears to be in the works, and as highlighted at the outset, One Media is looking to get in on the action, founder and CEO Michael Infante has confirmed.
The Sun shed light upon One Media’s offer for the catalog of Pink Floyd – or one percent of this catalog, to be specific – and the company posted an excerpt from the appropriate article to its website. One Media’s £3.5 million ($4.29 million at the present exchange rate) bid for the single-percent interest “should be taken seriously,” per the piece, and “includes access to anti-piracy software which would help protect the music.”
“We may not be the biggest player in town but we are profitable and we have cash in the bank,” the aforementioned Michael Infante communicated.
In terms of One Media’s financial situation, the business in late April reported a 9.59 percent year-over-year revenue improvement for the 12 months ending on October 31st, 2021. All told, One Media pulled down about $5.39 million during the fiscal year, factoring once again for the current GBP-USD conversion rate, and said that its 200,000-track catalog was worth $42.71 million.
Lastly, regarding the above-noted “anti-piracy software,” One Media has developed a tool called TCAT, which it relayed had turned in “positive early trials… with two major labels, the world’s largest digital aggregator and music trade body, the BPI.”
Time will tell whether Pink Floyd is receptive to One Media’s offer – and, needless to say, the prospect of a fractional selloff – but the public bid appears to reflect the continued availability of capital (and purchasers) in the segment. Five days back, Primary Wave bought Bob Dylan’s stake in the work of The Traveling Wilburys.