BERLIN (CelebrityAccess) — BMG’s corporate parent Bertelsmann released their annual report, revealing that the music company enjoyed record-breaking revenue growth in 2022.
According to Bertelsmann, BMG’s revenue increased to €866 million in 2022, up by more than 31% from the previous year.
Operating EBITDA improved by more than €50m in 2022 to top €195m, a 21.7% improvement on the company’s performance in 2022. At the same time, EBITDA margin improved year-over-year by more than a percentage point to 22.5%, Bertelsmann said.
Bertelsmann said that BMG’s growth was propelled by the largest annual investment in music content in the company’s history, investing more than half a billion euros during 2022.
BMG’s financial performance was driven in part by their recorded music division, which reported revenue of €348m, up by 38% year over year. Results were bolstered by hits from 5 Seconds of Summer, Lainey Wilson, Louis Tomlinson and Jason Aldean
BMG also saw strong performance from its music publishing division, where a combination of catalog and technology helped to grow revenue by 26% to €518m in 2022. Top performing song catalogues for BMG included works from Bruno Mars, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, Roger Waters and George Harrison.
The company also highlighted the success of their technological investment, noting that its “auto-match” achieved a rate of accurate registrations with collection societies of 99.7% and a percentage rate of royalties in “suspense” (frozen while checks are made) of less than 1%.
