Soundtrack says US businesses could be costing the music industry $1.4 billion a year through unlicensed music use. The Stockholm music service has also struck a deal with SESAC, giving it agreements with all four major US music rights groups.
Here's the wild part. A study paid for by Soundtrack found that 79% of American businesses with music on-site use personal streaming accounts. Those plans are meant for private use, not for playing songs to customers.
The research covered 1,525 people making business decisions across nearly 15,000 US locations. It found that 97% of firms play music, yet just 19% of those that do meet all the commercial rules.
And the gap in what firms think is legal is huge. Some 78% of those surveyed thought they met the rules, while 58% believed personal streaming accounts were fine for business use. Only 5% said they had licenses from ASCAP, BMI, GMR, and SESAC.
Soundtrack's latest agreement fills its last gap in US performance rights coverage. The firm already had deals with ASCAP, BMI, and Global Music Rights. It claims this makes its service the first consumer-style option to cover all four groups for commercial music use.
SESAC brings a big roster to the table. Its catalog holds over 1.5 million songs from more than 15,000 writers, composers, and publishers. Bob Dylan, Neil Diamond, Adele, and Ariana Grande are among its affiliates. Blackstone bought the rights group in 2017.
CEO Ola Sars thinks confusion drives much of the problem. In his view, most firms are not trying to dodge fees. They simply struggle with a system with many rules, separate licenses, and costs that are hard to figure out.
But a rights group license alone does not make Spotify or another personal streaming plan legal for shop use. Businesses need a music service cleared for commercial playback as well as the right public performance permissions.
That difference matters for cafes, hotels, stores, and other places where customers hear music. Soundtrack wants to offer a simpler way to get the needed rights while making sure artists and rights holders get paid.
The $1.4 billion figure is an estimate, not cash that has already gone missing from royalty accounts. Soundtrack estimates the nearly 3 million firms fail to meet the rules, or 81% of a market of roughly 3.8 million businesses.
Its math uses an annual fee of $468 for a legal background music plan. At that rate, 3 million firms would spend about $1.4 billion. The firm says that money could reach artists, rights holders, and licensed business music providers.
Sars had made a near-identical estimate of $1.38 billion before. That version used 3.8 million smaller US businesses, a 78% misuse rate, and the same $468 fee.
For some context, RIAA data put US wholesale music sales at $11.535 billion for 2025, a rise of 3.1%. Growth in the first half of that year came in below 1%. Soundtrack argues that fixing business music use could add a sum equal to over 10% of annual US recorded music sales.
The firm has quite a backstory as well. Sars set it up with Spotify in 2013 under the Soundtrack Your Brand name, then split it off in 2018. He also helped start Beats Music.
His view of the global market goes even further. Sars has put the annual business music gap at $30 billion to $40 billion beyond consumer music sales. That's his estimate of the wider chance for growth, rather than a verified total.
Soundtrack has also been buying its way into more markets. It acquired Tunify, active in Belgium and the Netherlands, along with UK music provider Ambie.
Its reach spans 75 countries, with clients such as Uniqlo, Dr. Martens, Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Kiehl's, Joe & The Juice, and TAG Heuer. The company puts its music library at over 150 million tracks.
For Soundtrack, the SESAC deal is a key part of its plan to make legal music easier for firms to use. Whether its revenue estimate holds up is a separate question, but the survey points to a big gap between what business operators believe and what their music licenses permit.
Here's the wild part. A study paid for by Soundtrack found that 79% of American businesses with music on-site use personal streaming accounts. Those plans are meant for private use, not for playing songs to customers.
The research covered 1,525 people making business decisions across nearly 15,000 US locations. It found that 97% of firms play music, yet just 19% of those that do meet all the commercial rules.
And the gap in what firms think is legal is huge. Some 78% of those surveyed thought they met the rules, while 58% believed personal streaming accounts were fine for business use. Only 5% said they had licenses from ASCAP, BMI, GMR, and SESAC.
Soundtrack's latest agreement fills its last gap in US performance rights coverage. The firm already had deals with ASCAP, BMI, and Global Music Rights. It claims this makes its service the first consumer-style option to cover all four groups for commercial music use.
SESAC brings a big roster to the table. Its catalog holds over 1.5 million songs from more than 15,000 writers, composers, and publishers. Bob Dylan, Neil Diamond, Adele, and Ariana Grande are among its affiliates. Blackstone bought the rights group in 2017.
CEO Ola Sars thinks confusion drives much of the problem. In his view, most firms are not trying to dodge fees. They simply struggle with a system with many rules, separate licenses, and costs that are hard to figure out.
But a rights group license alone does not make Spotify or another personal streaming plan legal for shop use. Businesses need a music service cleared for commercial playback as well as the right public performance permissions.
That difference matters for cafes, hotels, stores, and other places where customers hear music. Soundtrack wants to offer a simpler way to get the needed rights while making sure artists and rights holders get paid.
The $1.4 billion figure is an estimate, not cash that has already gone missing from royalty accounts. Soundtrack estimates the nearly 3 million firms fail to meet the rules, or 81% of a market of roughly 3.8 million businesses.
Its math uses an annual fee of $468 for a legal background music plan. At that rate, 3 million firms would spend about $1.4 billion. The firm says that money could reach artists, rights holders, and licensed business music providers.
Sars had made a near-identical estimate of $1.38 billion before. That version used 3.8 million smaller US businesses, a 78% misuse rate, and the same $468 fee.
For some context, RIAA data put US wholesale music sales at $11.535 billion for 2025, a rise of 3.1%. Growth in the first half of that year came in below 1%. Soundtrack argues that fixing business music use could add a sum equal to over 10% of annual US recorded music sales.
The firm has quite a backstory as well. Sars set it up with Spotify in 2013 under the Soundtrack Your Brand name, then split it off in 2018. He also helped start Beats Music.
His view of the global market goes even further. Sars has put the annual business music gap at $30 billion to $40 billion beyond consumer music sales. That's his estimate of the wider chance for growth, rather than a verified total.
Soundtrack has also been buying its way into more markets. It acquired Tunify, active in Belgium and the Netherlands, along with UK music provider Ambie.
Its reach spans 75 countries, with clients such as Uniqlo, Dr. Martens, Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Kiehl's, Joe & The Juice, and TAG Heuer. The company puts its music library at over 150 million tracks.
For Soundtrack, the SESAC deal is a key part of its plan to make legal music easier for firms to use. Whether its revenue estimate holds up is a separate question, but the survey points to a big gap between what business operators believe and what their music licenses permit.
