The Federal Court of Justice referred the decision relating to an increase of the GVL share in the GEMA tariff for public performance back to the Higher Regional Court in Munich.
After several years of negotiation, new general agreements were signed with the associations BCH and BITKOM in January 2014. Based on this event, the central collection and distribution organisation for private copying levies in Germany (ZPÜ), as a form of a collection one-stop-shop for nine German collective management organisations was now in a position to pass the belated remuneration on to the affiliated collective management organisations.
"We look back on a successful financial year 2013 where we were able to increase our total returns again. The positive news is emphasised by the recently received private copying remuneration for PCs that we had to declare as blocked funds in our annual accounts", report Guido Evers and Dr. Tilo Gerlach, GVL's Managing Directors.
GVL can look back on a successful financial year 2014: Total returns for 2014 amount to EUR 163.4m and are thus EUR 12.9m higher than in the previous year (+ 8.5%). This noticeable gain of returns is mainly due to increased claims for copying remuneration (EUR 35.1m compared to EUR 22.9m in the previous year), as well as back payments for private copies made on personal computers for the period 2011-2013.
In August 2010, the Arbitration Board of the German Patent and Trademark Office (DPMA) had deemed it adequate to increase the tariff to 30% of the GEMA tariff - this had been confirmed by the Higher Regional Court Munich in September 2012. Both sides had, however, appealed this decision; GVL appealed because it was not understandable why the tariff for performing artists and producers of sound recordings should amount to less than a third of that paid to authors; The dance school associations appealed because they rejected any increase whatsoever.
"Concluding these general agreements is a major breakthrough for us, as we finally managed to push through remuneration payments for our members - currently counting more than 145,000 - and the usage of their works on mobiles and tablets after many years", the two Managing Directors of GVL, Guido Evers and Dr. Tilo Gerlach rejoice. "For quite a few years now, many people use mobiles and tablets for making private copies.
The 7-digit revenue increases for each of the two categories broadcasting and public performance could not make up for the lower income collected for private copying. GVL's biggest income source, broadcasting remuneration, rose by 1.9% to EUR 81.8m compared to 2014 (EUR 80.3m). The neighbouring society's public performance revenues were also subject to an increase of EUR 1.7m, reaching a total of EUR 41.1m (which corresponds to a plus of 4.4%).
