business
ViacomCBS to Sell CNET for $500 Million to Red Ventures
ViacomCBS has struck a deal to sell its CNET unit to Red Ventures for $500 million. The transaction, which is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2020, is subject to regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions. CBS acquired CNET, which offers consumer electronics product reviews and news, in 2008 for $1.8 billion. Since the recombination of Viacom and CBS, the new ViacomCBS has been selling off non-core assets to reduce debt and free up financial fire power for expansions in the streaming space and other core businesses. The company, led by CEO Bob Bakish, also has put on the auction block CBS’ longtime Manhattan headquarters Black Rock and book publisher Simon & Schuster. “Red Ventures believes in the power of premium content from trusted brands that help ...
Rolling Stones Crush U.K. Chart Record With ‘Goats Head Soup’
After a tight race, The Rolling Stones finished with another chart crown and a place in the history books. The legendary British rock band bagged the title in the final hour with their reissue of Goats Head Soup (Polydor), the second time the album has ruled the Official U.K. Albums Chart. On this occasion, Goats Head Soup finished with an advantage of just 800 combined sales over the midweek leader, Declan McKenna’s Zeros. With their latest chart feat, The Stones become the first band in history to land a No. 1 album across six different decades. The Rolling Stones now have 13 No. 1 albums, including the 1973 original edition of Goats Head Soup, placing them level with Elvis Presley and Robbie Williams. Only The Beatles have more career No. 1 albums in the U.K., at 16. Mick Jag...
TikTok Sale: ByteDance Partners With Oracle
ByteDance has selected Oracle as its partner for a deal to keep TikTok operating in the U.S., a source familiar with the talks confirms to The Hollywood Reporter. The decision comes as ByteDance has rejected a bid by Microsoft that earlier this summer was seen as the likely option for the company as it looked to avoid a shutdown of the popular social media app amid increased tensions between the U.S. and China. Microsoft confirmed that its bid had been rejected in a statement on its corporate blog on Sunday night. “We are confident our proposal would have been good for TikTok’s users, while protecting national security interests,” the company wrote. “To do this, we would have made significant changes to ensure the service met the highest standards for security, priv...
All-Star ‘Music From The Home Front’ Charity Fundraiser Returns to No. 1 In Australia
There’s a familiar feel to the top end of Australia’s albums chart this week as Music From The Home Front (Bloodlines/Universal) returns to No. 1 and Powderfinger’s classic Odyssey Number 5 (Universal) reenters at No. 2, while Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP” (Atlantic/Warner) makes it a full month atop the national singles survey. The all-star Home Front album bagged two consecutive weeks at No. 1 in June and July, and returns for a third week off the back of its release on triple vinyl. The companion album to Michael Gudinski’s virtual concert on ANZAC Day, April 25, Home Front features performances from Jimmy Barnes, Crowded House, Dean Lewis, Tones And I and many others, with all profits going to Support Act, the charity that delivers crisis relief services to artists, crew and ...
Executive of the Week: RECORDS CEO Barry Weiss
This week, 24kGoldn and iann dior’s record “Mood” climbed into the top 10 of the Hot 100 in its fourth week on the chart, reaching No. 8 with the distinction of top airplay and streaming gainer honors. The track, released by RECORDS/Columbia, has been boosted by an unusual multi-genre appeal, which sees it spending its second straight week at No. 1 on the Hot Rock & Alternative Songs and Hot Alternative Songs charts, while maintaining a slot at No. 5 on the Hot Rap Songs chart. And that’s helped RECORDS CEO Barry Weiss earn the title of Billboard’s Executive of the Week, for helping shepherd the song to huge gains across the board. And while this is the first top 10 for 24kGoldn, Weiss isn’t expecting it to be his last. “He’s been building through old-fashioned artist...
Executive Turntable: WMG Names Head of Investor Relations, FUGA Makes Key Leadership Hires
Warner Music Group has hired Kareem Chin as senior vp head of investor relations effective immediately. Chin arrives at WMG from iHeartMedia, where he served in the same role. Chin, whose appointment follows WMG’s recent IPO, will lead the company’s investor relations efforts and work closely with the company’s finance and corporate communications teams. He will also oversee key events, including quarterly earnings calls and attendance at investor conferences. At iHeartMedia, which he joined as it was emerging from bankruptcy, Chin developed and built out the company’s investor relations function as it explored listing options and later made its debut on the Nasdaq exchange. Prior to that, he was vp investor relations at Viacom, a role that followed over a decade in investment banking. Mus...
Department of Justice Argues TikTok Employee Can’t Stop Trump’s ByteDance Ban
The Department of Justice argues a TikTok employee’s fear that the executive order banning transactions with Beijing-based parent ByteDance will keep him from getting paid isn’t enough to warrant a temporary restraining order that would keep the Department of Commerce from enforcing it. President Donald Trump on Aug. 6 issued an order that would bar “any transaction by any person” with ByteDance or any of its subsidiaries. TikTok on Aug. 24 sued, arguing its due process and first amendment rights were being violated. The same day, a technical program manager named Patrick Ryan sued Trump and U.S. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross Jr. arguing that the vaguely worded ban on transactions between U.S. persons and ByteDance could mean that he can’t get paid. Earlie...
U.S. Recorded Music Business Still Growing (A Bit) Amid Pandemic: RIAA 2020 Mid-Year Report
The good news: The U.S. recorded-music business was still in an upswing in the first half of 2020, growing 5.6% at retail to $5.7 billion, up from $5.4 billion, continuing a trend of growth that extends back to the industry’s nadir in 2015. The less-good news: That growth, like most everything else in the music business and beyond so far this year, took a pandemic-related hit, ending a short streak of double-digit gains after a 17% boost at mid-year 2017, 10% at mid-year 2018 and 18% at mid-year 2019. Of course, percentage-based growth, by its nature, is always increasingly-difficult to improve upon, and once-in-a-generation pandemics were never going to help keep that streak alive. And within that context there’s still plenty of good news for the industry in its continued recovery amid th...
Hipgnosis Songs Buys Big Deal Music
Merck Mercuriadis‘ Hipgnosis Songs has acquired independent publisher Big Deal Music, Billboard has learned. A formal announcement is expected as soon as Thursday. Under the deal, Big Deal will keep its Los Angeles-area office and staff, rebrand under the Hipgnosis banner and operate as Hipgnosis’ full-service U.S. office, a source familiar with the situation tells Billboard. Big Deal’s catalog includes songwriters Teddy Geiger (Shawn Mendes, Niall Horan), Kamasi Washington, Gary Numan, Ross Golan (Selena Gomez, Ariana Grande), and Sleater-Kinney, among others, as well as joint venture deals with Ricky Reed (Lizzo, Jason Derulo) and Diplo‘s Mad Decent. The company was founded by publishing vet Kenny MacPherson, whose resume includes founding Redhead Music Publishing...
SiriusXM Boosts 2020 Subscriber Forecast on ‘Strong’ Demand
Audio entertainment giant SiriusXM has raised its 2020 subscriber forecast ahead of an appearance by CEO Jim Meyer at a virtual investor conference on Wednesday. SiriusXM now expects full-year self-pay subscriber net additions of approximately 700,000, up from 500,000. The company reiterated its financial guidance for the year. “Our business continues to demonstrate strong performance and favorable trends since we resumed providing our subscriber and financial guidance in conjunction with our second- quarter earnings report” following the initial hit from the novel coronavirus pandemic, Meyer said in a statement. “It’s clear that demand for SiriusXM remains strong – quite simply, consumers continue to find immense value in our unique audio bundle and all of the ente...
BMI Posts Record Revenue Despite Pandemic Hit to Licensing
Collections from April to June fell by an estimated $60 million, but a digital boost helped make up the difference. BMI generated $1.311 billion in revenue in the year ended June 30, 2020, a 2.2% increase over the $1.283 billion it reported in the year earlier period. Distributions were up too, totaling $1.233 billion — a 3.1% increase from the $1.196 billion paid out to songwriters and publishers in the prior fiscal year. Domestically, the performance rights organization collected $961 million, increasing 1.9% from the year-earlier period. Foreign receipts grew 2.9% to $350 million. As a percentage of revenue, that breaks out to 73.3% domestic and 26.7% foreign, a 0.2% shift in favor of international collections compared to the prior year. BMI estimates that its fourth quarter reven...
The Players Behind DaBaby & Roddy Ricch’s ‘Rockstar’: See the Full Credits
DaBaby’s “Rockstar” feat. Roddy Ricch officially finished out the season at No. 1 on Billboard’s 2020 Songs of the Summer chart, having led the tally for 13 out of 15 tracking weeks. The annual chart tracks the most popular songs based on their cumulative performance on the weekly streaming-, airplay- and sales-based Billboard Hot 100 chart between Memorial Day and Labor Day. In addition, “Rockstar” was the most streamed song of the summer, having racked up 514.6 million streams, according to Nielsen Music/MRC Data. It topped the Hot 100 for a total of seven weeks. Explore the team of musicians, producers, engineers and more behind the track with recording credits provided by Jaxsta below. ArtistsMain Artist – DaBabyFeatured Artist – Roddy Ricch Songwriters:Composer Lyricist &#...
