Market development

Incomes of collective rights management organisations are subject to short-term fluctuations from year to year and from organisation to organisation.

Short-term trend 2012–2022

Income resulting from the collective rights management in CHF

Year ProLitteris SSA SUISA** SUISSIMAGE SWISSPERFORM
2012 32,200,000 19,896,000 131,722,000 56,510,000 43,890,000
2013 33,470,000 21,024,112 135,722,000 60,644,000 47,557,034
2014 34,170,000 21,333,430 141,319,000 62,800,000 48,688,685
2015 31,059,919* 22,734,527 142,680,732 66,848,931 51,550,157
2016 32,147,178 22,942,707 147,129,561 71,686,997 54,842,727
2017 34,933,115 22,876,045 150,039,912 80,702,423 60,257,825
2018 35,996,794 23,310,785 153,777,618 93,034,451 58,042,378
2019 35,598,036 25,259,783 160,878,900 79,254,918 58,323,980
2020 34,447,969 23,884,132 144,010,536 79,412,153 59,174,858
2021 34,191,374 20,841,775 149,550,200 84,520,077 62,321,791
2022 34,780,452 28,983,816 180,452,099 85,509,273 61,245,968

 

* The decrease in revenues in 2015 compared with 2014 was due to a change in accounting policy (intermediation transactions of CHF 1,565,525 were deducted for the first time) and in the time limit for writing back reserves for non-distributable remuneration (now five years instead of three, representing a decrease in revenues of approx. CHF 2 million in 2015.

** As of 2018, the consolidated revenues of the SUISA Group are listed. This includes the SUISA Cooperative society and SUISA Digital Licensing AG.


The growth in gross income – comparable over the last 15 years with the gross domestic product per capita – viewed over an extended period is largely attributable to the following factors:

  • New societies for additional repertoires and rightholders have been established whose rights are now exploited collectively. For example, ProLitteris and SUISSIMAGE were first authorised to administer rights in 1982, with SSA following in 1992 and SWISSPERFORM in 1993.
  • The collective management has been deliberately developed by the legislature: As a result of amendments to the law (1982, 1993, 2008, 2020) certain utilisations of copyright works are now remunerated via collective rights management organisations (retransmission rights, remuneration for private copying, photocopying in companies, rental levy, etc.).
  • A new form of utilisation comes into use. For example, technological progress led to television on mobile phones. This new utilisation has been licensed since 2005 through a relevant tariff and thereby made possible. Other examples of this are the virtual Personal Video Recorder (vPVR) and rented set-top-boxes with recording function for digital television. Internal company utilisations in digital form also led to the so-called network tariffs (JT 9).
  • An existing utilisation increases with a corresponding increase in income from the tariff. If, for example, more concerts are staged, there is a resulting increase in turnover in the SUISA concert tariff K.

In other words, the greater the use of protected music, films, literature, images, etc. the higher the receipts for the benefit of the authors. This incidentally corresponds to the principles of all international agreements in the area of authors’ and neighbouring rights. The Internet and mobile telephony in particular have led to many new forms of utilisation.

Conclusion
As a consequence of increasing mass utilisation, in recent decades there has been a shift away from individual management by the rightholders themselves towards collective management.

The goal of the collective rights management organisations is to provide a simple way for users to acquire rights and thereby ensure the authors and other rightholders a fair reward for the utilisation of their works. Authors’ rights create culture.

Christian Samuel Weber

"I am grateful that a strong rights management organisation is defending my rights and supporting me indirectly in my acting career."