Lyrics licensing firm Musixmatch has fired again towards rival LyricFind’s claims in an antitrust lawsuit involving the rights to license lyrics from writer Warner Chappell Music.
In new court docket submitting, attorneys for Musixmatch argued that LyricFind doesn’t have standing to sue its rival below US antitrust legal guidelines as a result of there’s no motive to imagine that Warner Chappell would have continued doing enterprise with LyricFind if it hadn’t signed a take care of Musixmatch.
LyricFind “would have suffered the identical alleged damage if WCM had as a substitute licensed these rights completely to a smaller rival or on a non-exclusive foundation to a number of different corporations however not LyricFind,” Musixmatch’s attorneys wrote.
“LyricFind’s alleged damage is thus not one the antitrust legal guidelines are designed to deal with.”
In a press release to MBW, a Musixmatch spokesperson asserted that LyricFind sued its rival as a result of “it didn’t safe rights and win a contract” with Warner Chappell.
“LyricFind is counting on bluster to distract from its enterprise failures,” the spokesperson wrote. “Rights house owners and digital service suppliers have a selection about whom they do enterprise with and we’re proud that our companions proceed to decide on us.”
LyricFind filed the antitrust go well with towards Musixmatch in March, arguing that the Musixmatch/Warner Chappell deal – which made Musixmatch the unique supplier of lyrics rights licensing and lyric information providers for songs printed by WCM, even for licensees which have a direct take care of the writer – made it unattainable for LyricFind to supply a complete catalog of lyrics.
It additionally ties the arms of music streaming providers by requiring them to license WCM lyrics by means of Musixmatch “at monopolistic costs,” LyricFind stated.
“That’s not only a hypothetical – it’s precisely what occurred with Spotify final yr, who had accomplished onboarding with LyricFind however had been robbed of the chance to pick the lyric supplier of its selection,” LyricFind founder and CEO Darryl Ballantyne wrote in an open letter.
In June, Musixmatch filed a movement to dismiss the case, arguing that the California court docket doesn’t have jurisdiction, as LyricFind is a Canadian firm, Musixmatch is Italian, and the settlement between WCM and Musixmatch is ruled by the legal guidelines of the UK.
“LyricFind is counting on bluster to distract from its enterprise failures.”
Musixmatch
Musixmatch additionally argued that Warner Chappell, as proprietor of the lyrics, “indisputably has the precise to completely license and distribute its mental property because it sees match.”
In a response to that movement, LyricFind’s attorneys argued that the federal court docket in California does have jurisdiction, as a result of Musixmatch “purposefully directed its anti-competitive conduct at the USA and California. America is the epicenter of the lyric-services business, dwelling to WCM’s licensing enterprise, a lot of Musixmatch’s management, and practically all main DSPs impacted” by the Musixmatch-WCM settlement.
In a reply in assist of its dismissal movement, filed on July 30 within the US District Court docket for the Southern District of California, Musixmatch rejected that argument.
“If LyricFind’s ephemeral ‘epicenter’ normal had been the check, there can be no limits to the Court docket’s potential to train private jurisdiction over international defendants: any plaintiff on this planet may plausibly allege that the USA, the world’s largest economic system, is the ‘epicenter’ of no matter business is related to their case, and thus set up jurisdiction.”
The reply will be learn in full right here.
It additionally argues that nothing LyricFind claimed “rebuts the easy indisputable fact that the purported damage to LyricFind was attributable to WCM’s choice to not grant LyricFind a license. LyricFind doesn’t allege that WCM would have continued to take care of it absent the WCM/Musixmatch settlement. That is deadly to LyricFind’s antitrust standing.”
LyricFind additionally launched an unredacted model of its authentic grievance, displaying that it alleged Musixmatch had tried to “purchase or bury” its rival, beginning with a bid to purchase LyricFind in 2023.
“Spotify… accomplished onboarding with LyricFind however had been robbed of the chance to pick the lyric supplier of its selection.”
Darryl Ballantyne, LyricFind
Musixmatch and its investor TPG – which LyricFind can also be suing within the antitrust case – “launched into a multi-faceted ‘purchase or bury’ scheme to exclude LyricFind and different suppliers from the market so it may proceed charging unlawfully inflated costs with out the chance of dropping enterprise,” LyricFind stated within the unredacted grievance.
LyricFind alleged that when this didn’t pan out, Musixmatch switched ways and centered on the take care of Warner Chappell.
Notably, LyricFind has signed at the very least one unique licensing deal of its personal, with Common Music Publishing Group in 2014, which gave LyricFind unique rights to sublicense UMPG lyrics. Nevertheless, that deal differs from the Musixmatch-WCM deal in that UMPG retained the precise to license its lyrics immediately, whereas Musixmatch’s deal offers it full exclusivity to license Warner Chappell lyrics.Music Enterprise Worldwide
