Universal Music Group and TikTok have unveiled a new multi-year strategic licensing agreement.
According to the announcement, the deal will further strengthen the existing relationship between the two companies, as well as providing additional benefits for artists, songwriters, creators and fans. The major and the short form video app famously fell out over licensing terms in early 2024, but reached an agreement within months.
“TikTok will continue to offer its global community access to UMG’s expansive recorded music and publishing catalogue, while fostering deeper engagement between creators and UMG’s artists and songwriters through best-in-class technology and promotional capabilities,” said a statement.
The Universal-TikTok deal follows the big news yesterday that UMG acts will be part of the launch for a new AI-powered tool as part of a new Spotify subscription tier, which will enable fans to create remixes and covers of tracks by participating artists and songwriters.
Building on the previous partnership announced in 2024, the new TikTok deal will further enhance creative and commercial opportunities for UMG’s artists and songwriters through expanded marketing and advertising campaigns, as well as access to e-commerce and other artist-centric tools.
The new deal also extends TikTok and UMG’s commitment to AI protections that promote human artistry and ensure platform economics effectively flow through to artists and songwriters. TikTok and UMG will work together to remove unauthorised AI-generated music from the platform, while further improving artist and songwriter attribution.
We look forward to driving innovative new fan experiences, while further improving social media monetisation, and protecting and amplifying human artistry
Michael Nash
The new agreement will deepen collaboration between TikTok and UMG across fan engagement experiences and artist development initiatives. According to today’s announcement, that will help highlight emerging artists from all over the world, strengthen connections between artists and audiences, and unlock new opportunities across discovery, fandom and digital experiences.
Michael Nash, executive vice-president & chief digital officer of Universal Music Group, said: “We’re proud of the pioneering work we’ve done with TikTok to create wide-ranging benefits for our artists and songwriters. With this new agreement, we look forward to driving innovative new fan experiences, while further improving social media monetisation, and protecting and amplifying human artistry.”
Tracy Gardner, global head of music business development at TikTok, said: “We’re excited to take our partnership with UMG to the next level, and build on the strong foundation we’ve already created together for artists, songwriters and fans.
“TikTok is a unique platform where music discovery, culture and fandom intersect, and this agreement will help create even more opportunities for artists and songwriters to engage audiences, grow their communities and achieve career success on a global scale.”
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‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.musicweek.com ’
