Virgin Music Group has agreed the sale of Curve Royalty Systems to Jamen Capital and Merlin.
The sale was a condition to the European Commission’s clearance of UMG’s acquisition of Downtown Music Holdings through Virgin Music Group in February of this year.
Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed, and the acquisition remains subject to final European Commission approval before closing.
“The acquisition secures the future independence of Curve, the royalty processing platform used by thousands of record labels, distributors, publishers, and distributed across the global music industry, while ensuring the company continues to operate independently with no changes to its brand, leadership team, services or client relationships,” said a statement.
Curve president Richard Leach will continue to lead the business as its standalone CEO, with the existing management and day-to-day teams to remain in place.
Under the new ownership structure, Jamen and Merlin will operate as strategic partners.
“Merlin’s involvement provides deep expertise in the independent sector and a governance structure which will ensure Curve remains embedded in the community it serves, while Jamen Capital brings long-term financial backing and deep experience investing in music technology businesses,” the statement continued.
The strategic partnership will enable Curve to accelerate its global growth opportunities and build more products.
The companies said the structure was specifically designed to preserve Curve’s neutrality and independence at a time of change across the music technology sector.
Richard Leach, CEO of Curve Royalty Systems, said, “This is an exciting moment for Curve. Throughout this process, our priority has been ensuring Curve remains an independent and agnostic platform, with a client-first approach that has earned the trust of rights-holders across the music industry. We are delighted to be entering this new chapter with Jamen and Merlin, whose vision for Curve aligns with our own. Their support secures Curve’s long-term independence and enables us to continue investing in expertise, technology and service that our clients rely upon. We look forward to building on our success together.”
Merlin is here to enable our members’ independence, and to be truly independent our sector needs its own infrastructure. Curve is central to that
Charlie Lexton
Matt Spetzler, founding partner of Jamen Capital, said: “Curve is exactly the kind of critical infrastructure the independent music sector needs; trusted, scalable and built around the real operational needs of modern music businesses. What stood out to us throughout this process was not just the sophistication of the platform, but the expertise and culture of the team behind it.
“Curve has earned enormous trust across the industry, and we’re committed to supporting its significant growth opportunities in payments and publishing while ensuring it provides ever increasing value to its longstanding label, distributor and artist clients. Data and royalty infrastructure is only becoming more important to the future of the music business.”
Charlie Lexton, CEO of Merlin, said: “Curve provides an essential service to independent music businesses around the world and has earned enormous trust through the quality of its service and relationships. Merlin is here to enable our members’ independence, and to be truly independent our sector needs its own infrastructure. Curve is central to that. That’s why ensuring its future independence and neutrality was vital to us and it’s why we stepped up to make this acquisition. We are delighted to support the next stage of Curve’s growth while ensuring it remains a part of the community it serves.”
Pieter van Rijn, COO, Virgin Music Group/CEO, Downtown Music, added: “Given the strength of our relationships within the independent community, we are happy that Jamen and Merlin are buyers that will help Curve continue to thrive as an exceptional resource to independent labels and entrepreneurs. Downtown and Virgin Music Group wish Richard and the Curve team every success in the future, and we're pleased we will continue to benefit from their services as a client.”
The acquisition reflects the growing strategic importance of royalty infrastructure with increasingly complex global rights flows, metadata requirements and reporting demands.
Curve currently provides royalty processing services across the recorded music and publishing sectors, supporting a client roster that includes Armada, Defected, Epitaph, Exceleration, Reservoir, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Virgin Music Group, Netflix and BBC/Demon, among others.
PHOTO (L-R): Matt Spetzler, Richard Leach and Charlie Lexton
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