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Press release: Public broadcasters ARD, ZDF and Deutschlandradio rely on music recognition by SoundAware
Hilversum, 13 May 2024
SoundAware will provide music usage reporting to GEMA and GVL for ARD, ZDF and Deutschlandradio, Germany's joint public broadcasters. SoundAware's audio fingerprint technology will be used by more than 130 public radio and television programs to identify the music played.
Radio and television broadcasters in Germany report the music they play on a per-second basis to the collecting societies GEMA and GVL. The distribution of royalties to rights holders is based on this data. Since 2020, this reporting has been carried out at ARD, ZDF and Deutschlandradio via a centrally operated, largely automated music recognition system. SoundAware was able to win in a new tender.
Ulrich Geiger (Joint Competence Centre Music of ARD and ZDF) welcomes the new cooperation: "We are delighted to have found in SoundAware a reliable and innovative partner for music reporting, capable of ensuring seamless and high-quality reporting to GEMA and GVL."
Harold de Groot (CEO of SoundAware) added: "We are honored to have been chosen as a partner and we are very excited to bring our expertise and technology to ARD and ZDF's music identification processes. The core of our collaboration is to promote fair remuneration for rights holders in the music industry. SoundAware is looking forward to this close cooperation with ARD, ZDF and Deutschlandradio."
Dutch SoundAware Group's market-proven Music Recognition Technology (MRT) recognises music in radio and television broadcasts reliably and with high accuracy. High reporting quality is the basis for accurate and reliable distribution to rights holders.
Reference recordings form the basis for automatic music recognition. The audio recordings are used to identify unique patterns in the frequency spectrum for each song. Using these "audio fingerprints", the algorithm can reliably recognise even short music clips in a TV or radio program.
About SoundAware
Music recognition technology service provider SoundAware is part of the Dutch SoundAware Group, based in Hilversum. SoundAware has extensive experience in automatic media monitoring and content recognition. Advanced technology and efficient applications enable objective, seamless and highly accurate identification of musical works in online and offline media. In July 2023, GEMA acquired a majority stake in the SoundAware Group.
Note to editors
Information from this press release may only be published with source acknowledgement from SoundAware. For more information, please contact Jeroen Kerkvliet - jeroen.kerkvliet@soundaware.nl
