SOCAN Acquires Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency (CMRRA)
The Canadian music rights organization has made an agreement to purchase the 50-year-old Canadian music licensing and royalty company from its current owner, SoundExchange, uniting two leaders in the broader rights handling sector.
Two Canadian music rights organizations are coming together to bring the distribution of performance and mechanical royalties under one umbrella.
SOCAN is acquiring the Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency (CMRRA).
The Canadian company dedicated to the administration of performance rights is set to to purchase the CMRRA, which has handled the distribution of reproduction rights in Canada for over five decades. SOCAN has made an agreement for acquisition from current owner, neighbouring rights company SoundExchange. The CMRRA, which celebrated its 50th anniversary last year, was purchased by SoundExchange in 2017.
“Bringing CMRRA and SOCAN together is an investment in the future of Canadian music. United, we’ll strengthen rights administration for publishers, songwriters and composers." Jennifer Brown, CEO of SOCAN, tells Billboard Canada. “We’re grateful for SoundExchange’s leadership, and we’re excited to work with CMRRA to shape the next chapter of how music rights are supported and delivered.”
Both SOCAN and the CMRRA are key players in the licensing and rights distribution fields, helping to fairly distribute hundreds of million dollars in royalties to their members. Last year, SOCAN reached an all-time revenue record of $587 million, distributing over $511 million to its rightsholders. Meanwhile, CMRRA distributed $94 million in royalties to its clients, celebrating its 50th anniversary while also welcoming 477 new client affiliations.
SOCAN CMO Cameron Kennedy and CMRRA president Paul Shaver both landed on the Billboard Canada Power Players 2026 list this year, earning their spot among the most powerful and influential executives in the Canadian music business.
The acquisition of CMRRA marks a major centralization of performance and reproduction rights under one umbrella, uniting two leaders in the broader rights handling sector. SOCAN has been dealing with CMRRA for nearly a decade, since acquiring the SODRAC in 2018 (Society for Reproduction Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers in Canada). SOCAN is now set to own the biggest handler of reproduction rights, adding to its own stewardship of public and performance rights.
"When SoundExchange acquired CMRRA nearly a decade ago, we saw an opportunity to strengthen its foundation, invest in its future, and enhance the services it provides to music publishers and songwriters," says Michael Huppe, president and CEO of SoundExchange. "Together, SoundExchange and CMRRA have built a strong, innovative and thriving organization. We are proud of the progress achieved and believe SOCAN is the right organization to build on that success. This transaction benefits creators, publishers and the broader music community while allowing SoundExchange to continue advancing our core mission of delivering value to artists and rights owners around the world."
The purchase also aligns the companies' similar visions, as they have both been increasingly focused on protecting copyrighted material amid the rise of AI.
SOCAN has shown some openness to AI, notably by allowing semi-AI-generated works to be registered in its database, while remaining committed to ensuring that the compensation of human work in AI-generated content is not circumvented. Recently, it teamed up with Musical AI as a technology partner to explore ways to fairly attribute the rights for AI-generated works and try to give artists more agency over how they want to engage with AI music, or not, and last year it led a nationwide campaign against unlicensed AI music.
Amid its anniversary, the CMRRA was already focusing on the future, and now it has been purchased by a company that is actively trying to innovate and adapt to the rapidly-evolving AI landscape.
“CMRRA’s success has always been driven by its people and its commitment to serving music publishers and self-published songwriters,” Paul Shaver, president of CMRRA, tells Billboard Canada. “We’re proud of the strong foundation built with the support of SoundExchange over the last nine years. This next chapter with SOCAN creates an opportunity to build on that work, strengthen our services, and continue evolving with the needs of the industry.”
