Case Study - Hospital Records
The Client
Hospital Records is an independent British record label and publisher based in South London. Primarily releasing drum and bass, the label was started in 1996 by Tony Colman and Chris Goss and has grown in recent years to become one of the most well-known labels within UK dance music. Their publishing arm, Songs In The Key Of Knife, represents over ten thousand works by over five hundred individual songwriters.
Hospital Records joined the Curve client list in 2018. Curve promised a platform that can improve their royalty processes and provide a streamlined way of working.
Key Challenges
- To reduce sales ingestion and royalty calculation times
- To efficiently manage the incoming sales statements from close to 100 DSPs, Collection Societies and Sub-Publishers
- To streamline and automate the royalty accounting process
- To find a platform that scales with changes in the music industry
- To find a solution that handles all master, mechanical and publishing royalty accounting responsibilities
- To gain the ability to send publishing catalogue in a CWR format
The Curve Solution
Curve offered Hospital Records a way of working that would not only vastly accelerate their processing times but enable them to provide amore transparent and flexible service to their artists. Curve onboarding processes are refreshingly simple and the communication with Curve's support team is consistently helpful.
Curve were reactive where necessary, stepping in when Hospital Records needed advice or assistance, but they were also pro-active, helping them with the process as and when they could, without prompt. The transparency was clear from the very start – Curve want their clients to have total control of their data, but they will be there to assist at every juncture. The software is comprehensive and can be used completely independently.
The Successes
- Hospital's royalty statements are ingested in a matter of minutes rather than hours. And artist statements are created in just a few hours rather than days.
- Ingesting sales data is as simple as dropping the statements into Curve. Curve's flexible Template tool can instantly recognise and process the royalty statements from all DSPs, Collection Societies and Sub-Publishers.
- Analysing sales data has become much easier, it can be exported from Curve in a simple and flexible way
- All metadata can be exported & managed easily and all accounting processes can be dealt with independently, without the assistance of Curve
- Curve’s CWR tool ensured detailed collection of publishing royalties and allowed Songs In The Key Of Knife to scale their global partnerships with sub-publishers and collection societies.
- When support is required, the Curve client management team is prompt & knowledgeable
- The user-friendly interface is very intuitive to work with. Only three people could use their previous system, now up to ten people now use Curve to regularly look at metadata or analytics.
- Artists now have access to their own online portal where they can view their statements and analyse their royalty data.
Time saving comparisons
“We moved to Curve in 2018 and were immediately impressed with the usability and transparency of the platform. The switch and onboarding process was seamless thanks to the support team’s prompt help. The speed of reports and sales uploads has improved the efficiency of our royalty department.” – Craig Dawson, Finance Director at Hospital Records
"Curve has been great for cutting our admin time down, especially the CWR delivery function and statement upload interface. I appreciate them constantly adding new helpful features, and the team have been proactive in implementing any feedback we’ve given them. Our artists also like the user area which gives them a convenient visual breakdown of their royalties.” – Tilo Hall, Publishing + A&R Manager at Songs In The Key Of Knife
