Snapchat signs global AR licensing deal with Sony Music
In the race by social media platforms to offer more audio options, Snapchat has struck a new global deal with Sony Music Entertainment (SME) to allow more users to incorporate more songs into their Snaps.
They can send them to other users or post them to Snapchat Spotlight.
SME acts now gain new commercial opportunities in short-form video and augmented reality experiences, said Dennis Kooker, SME’s president of global digital business.
“Through this agreement, our artists have more ways to connect with fans and enhance engagement in their music by enabling their songs to be part of the Lens and Sounds tools that support communication and creative expression among Snapchat’s users.”
Ben Schwerin, Snap’s SVP of content and partnerships, added: “Our new deal with Sony Music marks a major milestone as Snap now has partnerships with all the major labels, in addition to networks of independent labels and emerging artists.”
Snapchat is further integrating Sounds into its AR Lenses with a pre-selected song embedded into the lens; a lens that transforms pictures of anyone to appear as if they are singing a song; and ‘Cameo Sound Lenses’ which will “apply visual effects to put you and a friend as the stars of your own animated music video”.
Of its 280 million daily global users, 200 million engage with augmented reality, said the platform.
As of August 2021, Snapchat is the sixth most popular in Australia in the social media stakes, with 6.4 million monthly active users and 4.5 million daily active users.
Snap and Sony Music’s previous partnerships on an AR Lens generated impressive numbers.
One was Kygo’s collaboration with Whitney Houston for ‘Higher Love’. In three days, there were 16 million Snaps creations, and over 55 million views.
Calvin Harris and Rag’n’Bone Man’s ‘Giant’ sparked 90 million creations and one billion views; and G-Eazy and Halsey’s ‘Him And I’ led to 61 million creations and 750 million views.
Since launching the Sounds tool last October to let users add music to their Snaps, nearly 1.2 billion videos have been created using the function with nearly 77 billion views.
Nearly 40% of all videos created with music from Sounds were shared directly with friends via chat.
The new SME deal comes a fortnight after Snapchat’s deal with NBCUniversal to give users access to licensed audio clips from various NBCU TV shows and movies.
It already has deals in place with Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, Merlin, Sony Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group, Warner Chappell, Kobalt, BMG, NMPA members, DistroKid and thousands of individual songwriters and music publishers.