The Chairman's Report

This has been yet another memorable year in Koda’s long history. We currently find ourselves at a crucial turning point in the history of copyright management, a time when streaming, digitisation and free competition completely change the game – and where legislation needs to be changed and updated to match the new developments. It is a time of high-speed change.   

Koda reached a milestone in 2017: achieving a total turnover in excess of one billion Danish kroner (138 million EUR). This is worth celebrating – even if it was partly the result of backlogs and delayed payments within several fields. This result underpins that Koda is exactly where it should be in order to help the rightsholders for whose works we are responsible. It tells us that Koda is evolving and is a healthy business.

Huge effort was put into implementing the collective rights management directive, we have talked about for so many years now. We were well prepared, which enabled us to present a proposal for new articles of association at the General Meeting in April. Consequently, we experienced a record-breaking turnout at the general meeting, which was held at the Royal Danish Library, and also prompted many qualified candidates to run for the vacant positions on the Board of Directors, which welcomed three new authors and two new publishers. We would like to thank all the candidates who ran.

In 2017, we adopted a new framework for Koda’s cultural contributions. This means that all Koda members can now apply for funding to help them create new music. We are still working on making the system simpler and more transparent. The Board of Directors have placed great emphasis on expressing the Koda strategy more clearly through the distribution of the cultural contributions, thereby also making Koda’s position as sender more visible. 

The aforementioned directive stipulates that all collective rights management societies must prepare a transparency report, and in 2017 this task required huge efforts from the Koda staff. Koda was the first collective rights management society in Denmark to produce such a report, meaning no frame of reference was available to support the work. The end result was a carefully crafted piece of work that many other collective rights management societies now look to for inspiration on how to meet the new transparency requirements.

The transparency report offers a window for the outside world to look through at Koda – and a window through which we can look out at the world, comparing ourselves to others. It enables us as rightsholders to determine whether our chosen collective rights management society is the right match for us and our music. Having passed the one billion kroner turnover mark, there can be no doubt that Koda is onto something, even in this new and changing world.

This is important: even though individual music creators may feel the pinch, even though we may sometimes feel that the new streaming economy is pulling the rug away from under us and our work, and even though there are many more of us sharing the new sources of revenue, it is still crucial for us to band together in a society that understands what it means to be part of a market characterised by fierce competition – and a society who approaches this challenge with a professional, business-like outlook.

It is important for Koda to bring the biggest possible repertoire to the table when negotiating agreements. And in order to retain a large repertoire, rightsholders must feel that Koda really does do something for them. That there is a clear, transparent framework in place for all agreements and for the distribution of money so that everyone understands how the money is funnelled through the system. The Board of Directors and the Koda administration are keenly aware of the fact that Koda is also an IT enterprise – and an enterprise that must keep evolving.

On behalf of the Board of Directors, I would like to end by saying that we are proud of this year’s result, and that we fully realise that such results do not happen on their own. So we would like to warmly thank the management and the entire staff of Koda for this year’s efforts. And to thank all Koda members for their extraordinary involvement, commitment and curiosity.

Niels Mosumgaard, Chairman of the Koda Board of Directors

Koda’s Board of Directors by 27 April 2017

From the left on the floor: Jens Visby (employee representative), Frans Bak , Susi Hyldgaard (Chairman of the DPA Board of Directors), Peter Littauer - Musikforlæggerne, Niels Marthinsen - DKF, Niels Mosumgaard (Chairman of the Koda Board of Directors and Chairman of the DPA Board of Directors) og Niels Rønsholdt (Vice Chairman of the Koda Board of Directors).

From the left on the stairs: Bent Sørensen (Chairman of the DKF Board of Directors), Ole Dreyer Wogensen (Vice Chairman of the Koda Board of Directors and Chairman of the Musikforlæggerne Board of Directors) og Søren Winding. 

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