Scooter Braun
10/25/2024
The mogul purchased the pop star’s six-album catalog for upwards of $300 million in 2019.
10/25/2024
Scooter Braun announced his retirement from artist management on Monday (June 17), officially putting a cap on a 23-year run during which he guided the careers of some of the biggest pop stars of the 21st century, including Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Demi Lovato, J Balvin, Carly Rae Jepsen, The Kid Laroi and others.
“I have been blessed to have had a ‘Forrest Gump’-like life while witnessing and taking part in the journeys of some of the most extraordinarily talented people the world has ever seen,” Braun said in a statement issued on social media. “I’m constantly pinching myself and asking ‘how did I get here?’ And after 23 years this chapter as a must manager has come to an end.”
Braun sold Ithaca Holdings, the parent company of his management company SB Projects, to South Korean entertainment conglomerate HYBE in 2021.
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Braun will continue his work as HYBE America’s CEO.
A good portion of Braun’s 1,300-plus word send-off is spent recalling some of his fondest memories as a manager, including seeing Andrew Wyatt win a producer of the year Grammy, watching Quavo succeed as an entrepreneur, seeing Dan + Shay “go from local Nashville writers to sold out headliners,” and enjoying “brother Usher dominate the Super Bowl this year.” He also said he was “Kanye’s ‘gateway drug to business’ as we had amazing years of success when I was once able to call him my friend.”
He made sure to single out his two crowning clients — Bieber and Grande — “a 13 year old kid busking in Canada” and “a young actress on Nickelodeon” when he signed them.
“To see them both come up to be the legends they are today will forever be one of my greatest honors,” he said. “As we change our working relationships now, I will continue to root for them with the same passion that I did at each of their humble beginnings… There will never be a day where I don’t take great pride and honor in what we accomplished together.”
Read Braun’s full announcement:
23 years. That’s how long I have been a music manager. 23 years ago a 19 year old kid started managing an artist named Cato in Atlanta, GA and my journey began. Along the way I have had so many experiences I could never have dreamt of. I have been blessed to have had a ‘Forrest Gump”-like life while witnessing and taking part in the journeys of some of the most extraordinarily talented people the world has ever seen. I’m constantly pinching myself and asking “how did I get here?” And after 23 years this chapter as a must manager has come to an end.”
It’s a strange feeling because I think I have wanted this for a while, but I was truly afraid to answer the question “who would I be without them?” I was really just 19 years old when I started. So for my entire adult life I played the role of an artist manager on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And for 20 years I loved it. It’s all I had known. But as my children got older, and my personal Iife took some hits, I came to the realization that my kids were 3 superstars I wasn’t willing to lose. The sacrifices I was once willing to make I could no longer justify. It was time to step into a new role.
In this next chapter I have been honored to join as a board member of Hybe and serve as the CEO of Hybe America. My brilliant partner these past 3 years, Chairman Bang, has a vision I truly believe in. But even beyond that he has become a true friend who understands where I must be in my life these days. And that is a father first, a CEO second, and a manager no more.
Over the past 2 years I have been heading towards this destination, but it wasn’t until last summer that this new chapter became a reality. One of my biggest clients and friends told me that they wanted to spread their wings and go in a new direction. We had been through so much together over the last decade, but instead of being hurt I saw it as a sign. You see, life doesn’t hand you YOUR plan, it hands you GOD’s plan. And God has been pushing me in this direction for some time. I have nothing but love for those I have worked with over the years, and as we develop a different working relationship, I will always be in their corner to consult and support them whether it be directly or from afar. Every client I have had the privilege of working with has changed my life, and I know many of them are just beginning to see the success they deserve. I will cheer for every single one of them.
I have gotten to see my friend Andrew Watt win the Grammy for Producer of the year. I have laughed and cried as Lil Dicky truly became DAVE. I have witnessed an angel of a human Tori Kelly win Grammys and star in films. I have seen J Balvin live out his dreams of breaking boundaries, and Demi show kindness and grace that few megastars have. I have been moved as Zac Brown Band raised our flag and delivered the hits. I was excited the first time I heard Animals with Martin Garrix, and learned a new world with David Guetta and Steve Angello. I have danced to Carly Rae Jepsen’s Call Me Maybe and smiled ear to ear as PSY brought us Gangnam Style. I have watched Quavo grow to be an entrepreneur, and served as Kanye’s “gateway drug to business” as we had amazing years of success when I was once able to call him my friend. I have marched with YG and flown to Australia with Laroi to see the hometown kid rock an arena. I have seen Dan Shay go from local Nashville writers to sold out headliners and award winners. The list of artists goes on and on over 23 years. So many stories it would take me forever to name. From those first years with Asher Roth to watching my partner and brother Usher dominate the Super Bowl this year, it is truly overwhelming.But it was this past Christmas Day when Ariana and Justin became the biggest male and female in the history of the Spotify Billions club that I just smiled and thought “what a ride.” Justin and Ariana were both young teenagers when I began with them. Justin a 13 year old kid busking in Canada and Ariana a young actress on Nickelodeon. To see them both come up to be the legends they are today will forever be one of my greatest honors. As we change our working relationships now, I will continue to root for them with the same passion that I did at each of their humble beginnings. I remember the pranks and the water park shows with Justin, and the first time Ari opened an arena tour and her excitement side stage. I remember as they both stepped up for others and I got to witness them each change the world and make history. There will never be a day where I don’t take great pride and honor in what we accomplished together. The same can be said for so many I have had the pleasure of once being called “manager”.
There has been a lot said about what is happening in our company… and in my career. When we had success I smiled, and when we were attacked I tried to always take the high road. But for the last 3 years I have begun to feel that taking the high road has created confusion and ambiguity as to who we are. I may have left my role in management, and my business relationship with many clients will alter and change, but this does not mean we as a company are leaving. Both Allison Kaye and Jennifer McDaniels are more than capable to lead and as we combine new resources the opportunities with their leadership are endless. These two incredibly powerful women will now step into a role that I know will grow into the most impressive women-led management business our industry has even seen. While my name may have been on the door all these years, the truth is there is no one as brilliant as Allison Kaye, and few who can manage with the grace and poise of Jen McDaniels.
We at Hybe will continue to grow. With the addition of QC to Hybe America and our existing business at Big Machine, we will continue to add amazing execs and artists to the roster. Our WeVerse platform and growing gaming unit is something the whole industry can celebrate and join. Getting the opportunity to A&R and Executive Produce the solo career of Jung Kook last summer, and work with the other members of BTS as we break worldwide records, has been an absolute honor. With new acts like NewJeans, TXT, LE SSERAFIM, Seventeen, ILLIT, The Scarlet Opera, Ava Max, and many other new artists and ventures, the future is bright. I’m honored to join Chairman Bang and Jiwon Park as we grow HYBE from the multi-billion dollar publicly traded company it is today to the worldwide multifaceted entertainment platform it is destined to be.
With Hybe going strong I am also looking forward to continuing to invest in a new generation of entrepreneurs and serve as a national board member of Make A Wish and help individuals and communities through our family’s Braun Foundation. Between all of this and coaching my kids I’m not worried about being busy 🙂
So yes, it’s been 23 years. And yes, this chapter has come to an end. But the great Berry Gordy once told me “young man, it never ends the way you wanted, but it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.” That wisdom has proven to be correct. I never saw how this chapter would end, hell, I never even saw it happening. But it did. And I will cherish every moment of it. I made my plan… but it turns out I like God’s plan better. Cheers!
Scooter Braun is stepping up his efforts to help the people affected by the Oct. 7th terrorist attacks in Israel and Palestinians suffering from the devastating war in Gaza, with the music mogul keen to stress “you can do two things,” by helping both groups.
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The HYBE-America CEO posted a lengthy video on Instagram on Wednesday night that outlined his plans to work with humanitarian agency CARE International and the Hostages and Missing Families Forum in Israel, personally donating a total of $200,000 to get much-needed financial support to the people most acutely impacted by the ongoing conflict.
Braun said he, along with his Palestinian-American friend Nasim and Scott Budnik, will be kicking off the Care Together campaign with Care.org next week and that he would be personally donating $100,000. The campaign, Braun says, “will help 200 Palestinian families with sustainable help in this time of need.”
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He also stated that at the same time he will donate $100,000 to the Hostages and Missing Families Forum in Israel, a group that according to its website says it “offers families holistic medical and emotional support as well as professional assistance, and advances the ongoing efforts locally, regionally and globally, to bring the hostages and the missing back home.”
Braun added, “I’ve always said something, you can do two things. You can say, free the hostages, and also want the Palestinian people who are innocent to be protected from Hamas and this war.”
In the video, Braun began by speaking about his late grandmother Eva, a Holocaust survivor, on the occasion of what would have been her 94th birthday, and how her kindness inspires him to “do what I do next.”
“The world is a crazy place, and I feel like there’s a very big misunderstanding. There’s all this antisemitism, hate, finger-pointing in all directions. But it’s not because I would refute my Judaism, or it’s not because I’m not proud of my Judaism that I do what I do next,” Braun says, seeming to reference the online criticism he has received recently from some sections of the BTS fandom and also perhaps a passing reference to Jonathan Glazer’s Oscar’s speech with the use of the word “refute.”
He adds that he is doing what he is doing “because of my grandmother, because of my grandfather, because of what they endured, because of the lessons that they taught me, and the lessons that my Judaism teaches me that I care.”
Full text of Braun’s video message:
I normally don’t make videos for these type of things, but I felt like this was important. Today would have been the 94th birthday of my grandmother, Ma, Eva. She was a Holocaust survivor, a survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp. In her honor, I do what I do next. The world is a crazy place, and I feel like there’s a very big misunderstanding. There’s all this anti-Semitism hate, finger-pointing in all directions. But it’s not because I would refute my Judaism, or it’s not because I’m not proud of my Judaism that I do what I do next. It’s because of my grandmother, because of my grandfather, because of what they endured, because of the lessons that they taught me, and the lessons that my Judaism teaches me that I care.
Because of that, with the help of my friend Nasim, a Palestinian-American who’s also the son of a refugee just like me, and my friend Scott Budnik, we’re starting a campaign next week called Care Together, along with the organization Care.org, which will get aid to Palestinians, innocent Palestinians in need right now. I will personally be donating $100,000 to kick off that campaign, and that will help 200 Palestinian families with sustainable help in this time of need.
But I’ve always said something, you can do two things. You can say, free the hostages, and also want the Palestinian people who are innocent to be protected from Hamas and this war. That is why I’ll also be matching that $100,000 with another $100,000 donation to the Hostages and Missing Families Forum in Israel to help those families affected by Oct. 7th, and those families still suffering because those hostages deserve and must come home.
I wanted to do this because you can do two things. You can call for the hostages, and you can call for innocent people in a war to be protected. I want to be clear that it is because of my culture, because of my Judaism, because of the idea of ‘tikun olam,’ which means repair the world, heal the world, which is all Jews are called on to do, that I make these donations, and I ask people to do the same, and I ask people to step up with action. In honor of my grandmother, in honor of her 94th birthday. She saw the absolute worst of humanity. She wasn’t yelling at people on TikTok or Instagram. She lived it. She was 15 years old when they ripped her from her home, and 26 members of her family, including her parents and her sister, were killed. She stayed in that concentration camp for a year until she was liberated, [she was there] every single day.
Even though [my grandmother] saw the worst of humanity, she chose to be kind to all people. That is why, in this moment, while I believe Israel has the right to defend itself and Israelis have the right to protection and safety, I think the same for Palestinians. It is because I am a Jew that I make these donations. I’m grateful to my Palestinian-American friend… Both of us grew up in Connecticut. Both of us love Thundercats. Both of us love our families. If my family would have immigrated to Israel and his family would have stayed in the West Bank, we might be put in a position to fight right now with each other. But because we’re here, we have an opportunity to be friends and try and go towards a future that we all claim we want over there. I know this was long-winded, but Ma, this one was for you. I love you. I miss you. I hope everyone can join in and do the same. Thanks.
This article was originally published by The Hollywood Reporter.
Scooter Braun called for popular artists “with much bigger platforms” to demand the release of the hostages that were taken by Hamas from an Israeli electronic music festival.
“Say something, ask for the hostages to come home,” Braun said in an Instagram video posted on Friday (Dec. 22). “Say that no music festival deserves this.” Hamas attacked the Supernova Sukkot Gathering on Oct. 7, killing more than 360 people and taking a number of hostages.
Braun is joined in the Instagram video by Rachel, the mother of a hostage named Hersh. (She is not identified by last name in the video, but her story matches that of Rachel Goldberg.) “The silence from the music industry has been so deafeningly palpable for us,” Rachel says. Later she adds, “I just hope that you will be brave enough to use your platform.”
Braun picks up on this theme. “I’m begging of my own industry to just post something,” he says. “These kids deserved our voices, and we as an industry have done it time and time again — we’ve given our voices.”
In 2017, Braun helped organize a major benefit concert for the victims of the terrorist attack that took place at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England. Grande performed at the benefit along with Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, Coldplay, and others, raising more than $12 million. “There’s been so much negativity and such a lack of leadership when we’re looking to have hope,” Braun said at the time.
Read a transcript of Braun’s comments below.
Scooter Braun: I am here with Rachel, Hersh’s mom… Her son is now 76 days being held in Gaza. The last images she saw of him, he had his left arm blown off. He’s a lefty like she is. We just had an amazing conversation I’m going to share. I want to be clear this is not what I do. I find it insane that I’m the one standing here with her or that we’re the ones who had a conversation. There should be people with 100 million followers and much bigger platforms who do this for a living, who are artists, who are reporters, who should be giving her a platform. And privately, she told me she has reached out to so many people, but because of the nuance of the conflict, they don’t want to talk about this. I think every single one of us in our industry knows that if this was any other situation, any other country, we’d be losing our minds speaking of how a music festival is not an appropriate place for people to be shot in cold blood. For them to be blown up or shot as they’re running away or taken prisoner and hostage like her son for over 70 days.
Rachel: I did want to say that 364 young people were killed at the Nova Music Festival. And over 40 of them were taken hostage and are still being held. A lot of those kids were coming from all over the world. And I think that that’s getting lost in a larger picture of pain and confusion, because it is a really complicated neighborhood that we live in. But I think that the silence from the music industry has been so deafeningly palpable for us and for all of the people who have children who were either massacred or are missing. And I just hope that you will be brave enough to use your platform because you have to be able to look at yourself and know that you’re doing the right thing for those kids who died at that festival or those kids who are suffering terribly in captivity right now. And I hope that you have the courage to do that. And maybe what might surprise you is you’ll get more fans and you’ll get more credit in the wold that you’re part of.
Braun: This is not what either of us do. I’m a behind the camera guy and she’s a mom and a teacher. I’m begging of my own industry to just post something, say something, ask for the hostages to come home. Say that no music festival deserves this. These survivors I met last night, they started naming many of you artists and asking me, ‘Why have you said nothing? These are our heroes. What if this happened somewhere else?’ So I’m going to end this here. These kids deserved our voices, and we as an industry have done it time and time again — we’ve given our voices. This was one of our things. This was a music festival. Not asking for you talk about the Kibbutzim right now. I’m not asking for you to talk about the massacre. I’m not even asking you to talk about the conflict right now. This was ours. This was a music festival, a peaceful music festival. They deserve to hear our voices right now as an industry. And shame on us if we don’t do it.
Ariana Grande has a new manager in Brandon Creed. The superstar has signed with his newly-launched Good World Management firm, sources tell Billboard.
Grande made major headlines in August when she split with longtime manager Scooter Braun‘s SB Projects. Grande had been with the company since 2013, the year she released her breakthrough debut album, Yours Truly.
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“[Ariana] likes that he understands her on a different level and between acting and music, she has a lot coming up and is excited to have found a new support system to help her execute her plans,” says a source close to the situation.
“She wants the focus to be her art and he puts her artistry and vision before anything else,” adds another source. “He is the perfect person to help her execute her visions for this next chapter of her life and career.”
In 2017, Creed — a longtime manager whose previous clients have included Bruno Mars and Lizzo — merged his own The Creed Company with Irving and Jeffrey Azoff‘s firm to form Full Stop Management. He split with the Azoffs in July, announcing the launch of Good World Management, bringing his clients Mark Ronson, Troye Sivan and Charli XCX along with him. Grande marks his third major signing since then.
In early August, Creed and Lydia Asrat announced they had signed Normani to a co-management deal through Good World and Asrat’s Q10. Then, in September, he signed Demi Lovato — another former Braun client.
Grande has had eight charting albums on the Billboard 200, six of them hit the top 10, with five topping the list. Her last release, Positions, debuted atop the chart in 2020 and spent two weeks at No. 1.On the Hot 100, she’s logged 73 entries — including 20 top 10s, seven of which hit No. 1. She most recently led the tally with her remix collab on “Die for You” with The Weeknd in March 2023.
Across her catalog of songs, she’s generated 23.5 billion on-demand official streams in the U.S., according to Luminate. Her albums have earned 22.4 million equivalent album units in the U.S, of which traditional album sales equal 3.3 million.
Grande recently teased her forthcoming seventh studio album with a series of photos posted to Instagram back in the studio. Artists including Selena Gomez, Billie Eilish and SZA expressed excitement in the comments for the pop star’s anticipated return.
On Saturday (Dec. 9), Grande performed “Oh Santa!” alongside Mariah Carey in New York. Next year, she will star as Glinda alongside Cynthia Erivo in the long-awaited Wicked film.
For some music companies, 2022 was the payoff for weathering the darkest days of the COVID-19 pandemic. When business returned that year — sometimes in record-setting fashion — these companies rewarded their executives handsomely, according to Billboard’s 2022 Executive Money Makers breakdown of stock ownership and compensation. But shareholders, as well as two investment advisory groups, contend the compensation for top executives at Live Nation and Universal Music Group (UMG) is excessive.
Live Nation, the world’s largest concert promotion and ticketing company, rebounded from revenue of $1.9 billion and $6.3 billion in 2020 and 2021, respectively, to a record $16.7 billion in 2022. That performance helped make its top two executives, president/CEO Michael Rapino and president/CFO Joe Berchtold, the best paid music executives of 2022. In total, Rapino received a pay package worth $139 million, while Berchtold earned $52.4 million. Rapino’s new employment contract includes an award of performance shares targeted at 1.1 million shares and roughly 334,000 shares of restricted stock that will fully pay off if the company hits aggressive growth targets and the stock price doubles in five years.
Live Nation explained in its 2023 proxy statement that its compensation program took into account management’s “strong leadership decisions” in 2020 and 2021 that put the company on a path to record revenue in 2022. Compared with 2019 — the last full year unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic — concert attendance was up 24%, ticketing revenue grew 45%, sponsorships and advertising revenue improved 64%, and ancillary per-fan spending was up at least 20% across all major venue types. Importantly, Live Nation reached 127% of its target adjusted operating income, to which executives’ cash bonuses were tied.
The bulk of Rapino’s and Berchtold’s compensation came from stock awards — $116.7 million for Rapino and $37.1 million for Berchtold — on top of relatively modest base salaries. Both received a $6 million signing bonus for reupping their employment contracts in 2022. (Story continues after charts.)
Lucian Grainge, the top-paid music executive in 2021, came in third in 2022 with total compensation of 47.3 million euros ($49.7 million). Unlike the other executives on this year’s list, he wasn’t given large stock awards or stock options. Instead, Grainge, who has been CEO of UMG since 2010, was given a performance bonus of 28.8 million euros ($30.3 million) in addition to a salary of 15.4 million euros ($16.2 million) — by far the largest of any music executive.
This year, shareholders have shown little appetite for some entertainment executives’ pay packages — most notably Netflix — and Live Nation’s compensation raised flags at two influential shareholder advisory groups, Institutional Shareholder Services and Glass Lewis, which both recommended that Live Nation shareholders vote “no” in an advisory “say on pay” vote during the company’s annual meeting on June 9. Shareholders did just that, voting against executives’ pay packages by a 53-to-47 margin.
Failed “say on pay” votes are rare amongst United States corporations. Through Aug. 17, just 2.1% of Russell 3000 companies and 2.3% of S&P 500 companies have received less than 50% votes on executive compensation, according to executive compensation consultancy Semler Brossy. (Live Nation is in both indexes.) About 93% of companies received at least 70% shareholder approval.
ISS was concerned that the stock grants given to Rapino and Berchtold were “multiple times larger” than total CEO pay in peer group companies and were not adequately linked to achieving sustained higher stock prices. Additionally, ISS thought Live Nation did not adequately explain the rationale behind the grants.
To determine what Rapino, Berchtold and other executives should earn, Live Nation’s compensation committee referenced high-earning executives from Netflix, Universal Music Group, SiriusXM, Spotify, Endeavor Group Holdings, Fox Corporation, Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. and Paramount Global. Netflix co-CEOs Reed Hastings and Ted Sarandos were paid $51.1 million and $50.3 million, respectively, in 2022. Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslov made $39.3 million in 2022 — including a $21.8 million cash bonus — a year after his pay totaled $246.6 million, including $202.9 million in stock option awards that will vest over his six-year employment contract. Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel and executive chairman Patrick Whitesell received pay packages worth $308.2 million and $123.1 million, respectively, in 2021 thanks to equity awards tied to the company’s IPO that year (the received more modest pay of $19 million and $12.2 million in 2022).
Some companies in the peer group didn’t fare well in “say on pay” votes in 2023, though. Netflix, got only 29% shareholder approval in this year’s say-on-pay advisory vote after Hastings’ and Sarandos’ compensations both increased from higher stock option awards while the company’s stock price, riding high as COVID-19 lockdowns drove investors to streaming stocks, fell 51% in 2022. Warner Bros. Discovery’s 2022 compensation squeaked by with 51% shareholder approval.
Minutes from UMG’s 2023 annual general meeting in May suggest many of its shareholders also didn’t approve of Grainge’s compensation. UMG’s 2022 compensation was approved by just 59% of shareholders, and the company’s four largest shareholders own 58.1% of outstanding shares, meaning virtually no minority shareholders voted in favor.
UMG shareholders’ votes could be meaningfully different next year. Anna Jones, chairman of the music company’s remuneration committee, said during the annual meeting that in 2024, shareholders will vote on a pay package related to Grainge’s new employment agreement that takes minority shareholders’ concerns from the 2022 annual meeting into consideration. Grainge’s contract lowers his cash compensation, and more than half of his total compensation will come from stock and performance-based stock options.
Other companies in Live Nation’s peer group received near unanimous shareholder approval. SiriusXM’s 2022 executive compensation received 98.5% approval at the company’s annual meeting. Paramount Global’s executive compensation was approved by 96.4% of its shareholders. Endeavor didn’t have a “say on pay” vote in 2023, but a year ago, it’s sizable 2021 compensation packages were approved by 99% of voting shareholders.
As the radio industry came back from pandemic-era doldrums, two iHeartMedia executives — Bob Pittman, CEO, and Richard Bressler, president, CFO and COO — were among the top 10 best-paid executives in the music industry. It was new employment contracts, not iHeartMedia’s financial performance, that put them into the top 10, however. Both executives received performance stock awards — $6.5 million for Pittman and $6 million for Bressler — for signing new four-year employment contracts in 2022. Those shares will be earned over a five-year period based on the performance of the stock’s shareholder return. Neither Pittman nor Bressler received a payout from the annual incentive plan, however: iHeartMedia missed the financial targets that would have paid them millions of dollars apiece. Still, with salaries and other stock awards, Pittman and Bressler received pay packages valued at $16.3 million and $15.5 million, respectively.
Spotify co-founders Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon once again topped the list of largest stockholdings in public music companies. Ek’s 15.9% stake is worth nearly $4.8 billion while Lorentzon’s 11.2% stake has a market value of nearly $3.4 billion. Both Ek and Lorentzon have benefitted from Spotify’s share price more than doubling so far in 2023. In September 2022, the inaugural Money Makers list had Ek’s stake at $3.6 billion and Lorentzon’s shares at $2.3 billion.
The billionaire club also includes No. 3 HYBE chairman Bang Si-hyuk, whose 31.8% of outstanding shares are worth $2.54 billion, and No. 4 CTS Eventim CEO Klaus-Peter Schulenberg, whose 38.8% stake — held indirectly through his KPS Foundation non-profit — is worth $2.25 billion. They, too, have benefitted from higher share prices in 2023. Last year, Bang’s stake was worth $1.7 billion and Schulenberg’s shares were valued at $2.1 billion.
These top four shareholders and three others in the top 10 have one important thing in common — they are company founders. At No. 5, Park Jin-young, founder of K-pop company JYP Entertainment, owns a $559 million stake in the label and agency he launched in 1997. Another K-pop mogul, No. 8 Hyunsuk Yang, chairman of YG Entertainment, owns shares worth $199 million in the company he founded in 1996. And No. 9 Denis Ladegaillerie, CEO of 18-year-old French music company Believe, has a 12.5% stake worth $112.7 million.
Live Nation’s Rapino again landed in the top 10 for amassing a stockholding over a lengthy career, during which he has helped significantly increase his company’s value. Rapino, the only CEO Live Nation has ever known, took the helm in 2005 just months before the company was spun off from Clear Channel Entertainment with a market capitalization of $692 million. Since then, Live Nation’s market capitalization has grown at over 20% compound annual growth rate to $19.1 billion. Rapino’s 3.46 million shares represent a 1.5% stake worth $291 million.
Selling a company that one founded is another way onto the list. Scooter Braun, CEO of HYBE America, has a 0.9% stake in HYBE worth $69.8 million. That’s good for No. 10 on the list of executive stock ownership. Braun, HYBE’s second-largest individual shareholder behind chairman Bang, sold his company, Ithaca Holdings — including SB Projects and Big Machine Label Group — to HYBE in 2021 for $1.1 billion.
These rankings are based on publicly available financial statements and filings — such as proxy statements, annual reports and Form 4 filings that reveal employees’ recent stock transactions — that publicly traded companies are required by law to file for transparency to investors. So, the list includes executives from Live Nation but not its largest competitor, the privately held AEG Live.
Some major music companies are excluded because they are not standalone entities. Conglomerates that break out the financial performance of their music companies — e.g., Sony Corp. (owner of Sony Music Entertainment) and Bertelsmann (owner of BMG) — don’t disclose compensation details for heads of record labels and music publishers. Important digital platforms such as Apple Music and Amazon Music are relatively small parts of much larger corporations.
The Money Makers executive compensation table includes only the named executive officers: the CEO, the CFO and the next most highly paid executives. While securities laws vary by country, they generally require public companies to named executive officers’ salary, bonuses, stock awards and stock option grants and the value of benefits such as private airplane access and security.
And while Billboard tracked the compensation of every named executive for publicly traded music companies, the top 10 reflects two facts: The largest companies tend to have the largest pay packages and companies within the United States tend to pay better than companies in other countries.
The list of stock ownership is also taken from public disclosures. The amounts include common stock owned directly or indirectly by the executive. The list does not include former executives — such as former Warner Music Group CEO Stephen Cooper — who are no longer employed at the company and no longer required to disclose stock transactions.
Last week, news broke that Ariana Grande had split with longtime manager Scooter Braun. This followed news that former SB Projects client Demi Lovato had parted ways with Braun. Since, we also confirmed that Idina Menzel has left the roster. At first, a source familiar with the situation called news of Grande’s departure “rumors.” They […]
Justin Bieber‘s and Scooter Braun’s success has been inextricably intertwined since 2008 when Braun discovered the then-13-year-old singer on YouTube, got him signed to Usher’s record label and became his manager. Braun made Bieber’s career, and vice versa, and their once-flourishing business relationship was arguably the catalyst for Braun adding Ariana Grande, Demi Lovato, J Balvin, Idina Menzel and many others to the management roster at his SB Projects, and the subsequent sale of its parent company Ithaca Holdings to Korean K-pop entertainment giant HYBE for $1.06 billion in April 2021 and his appointment as HYBE America’s CEO that followed.
But since then, Braun has moved his focus away from his management business and onto growing HYBE, shepherding massive deals like its $300 million purchase of hip-hop company Quality Control in February. That shift is one factor that’s had Bieber actively looking at how he might extract himself from that relationship with the help of his new music lawyer, David Lande, and prompting Braun’s other star clients to exit as well, sources tell Billboard. Grande is also planning to part with Braun on friendly terms, more because she’s “excited to go in a different direction” and because she’s “outgrown him” than because of his C-suite distractions, a source close to her says: “It’s time for something new.” Menzel, Balvin and Lovato departed earlier this year, on good terms as well, sources say.
But even for the world’s biggest superstars, leaving your manager is easier said than done — and Bieber and his lawyer are still exploring all their options, sources tell Billboard, with a full split not guaranteed. Bieber’s latest moves have included firing his agency, CAA, and hiring a new music lawyer — Lande at Ziffren Brittenham — to replace Aaron Rosenberg, whom Braun had helped hire. (Michael Rhodes, a partner at the Cooley law firm remains Bieber’s general counsel.)
Lande, these sources say, has been looking at how to extricate Bieber from the management agreement with Braun, but there’s a major complication: Bieber is still under contract for about four more years, following a series of amendments to their deal made three years ago, sources say, and standard management contracts tend to favor the manager. To get out entirely free of obligations, an artist must often show that their manager breached the agreement — which generally includes acting outside of an artist’s best interests, such as financial impropriety like siphoning funds. And only in the most extreme examples does a manager being unavailable or unreachable count. (Were that the case, Braun’s team at SB projects would likely give him significant cover: Braun’s lieutenant, Allison Kaye, has been running management as president of SB Projects since 2016.) Sometimes there are performance metrics, but given Bieber and Braun’s stature in the industry, that’s unlikely, music lawyers say.
“If you’re talking about a case where the artist is just no longer content with their current manager and wants to get out of their management deal, they have a high bar to clear,” says entertainment attorney Larry Katz. “The only chance an artist would have is if they can demonstrate a well-documented pattern of failure by the manager.”
That said, many managers and lawyers agree that it is not in anyone’s best interest to hold an artist in a contract against their will. “Slavery is not a thing,” says one manager.
A scenario like this usually results in the artist and manager striking a new deal that involves a lump sum paid to the manager; a commission on future monies made from deals in which the manager was involved; a sunset clause that gives the manager a gradually decreasing percentage of earnings from such deals — or, likely, a combination of these.
Perhaps because of these complications, sources familiar with some of Bieber’s business dealings say he is focused on resolving his predicament with Braun and would not begin a serious search for new management until that objective is completed — or may not seek a new manager at all.
Otherwise, Bieber would need to shoulder the cost of paying two managers until his agreement with Braun either expired or was dissolved.
A new manager would also face limited options for finding new income opportunities. Bieber is still under a recording contract with Def Jam as he currently works on his seventh studio album, meaning there’s no new multi-million-dollar label deal on the immediate horizon. He also sold his publishing, artist royalties from his master recordings and neighboring rights to Hipgnosis for over $200 million earlier this year. And he remains under contract with AEG Presents, which has promoted his concerts since his inaugural My World Tour in 2010.
Under that AEG deal, Bieber likely owes the promoter any advances paid for his tours that haven’t been recouped. This would likely include an upfront signing fee paid to AEG to promote Bieber’s tours, as well as a per-show guarantee — some or all of which would be recoupable against the tour’s ticket sales. These financial obligations are usually settled somewhere between the early planning of the tour and while it’s in progress, but Bieber’s situation is more complicated. That’s because he has repeatedly rescheduled or canceled touring plans over the past three years due to the coronavirus pandemic and personal health issues, which could mean that his deal with AEG has yet to recoup its obligations.
Still, sources agree Bieber remains an appealing client, because of the kind of influence that comes with his superstar stature.
As for the status of Bieber and Grande’s relationship with SB Projects, sources close to Braun’s camp say both artists are under contract but are currently working out new deal structures to account for Braun stepping into his larger role as HYBE America CEO. Sources close to Bieber and Grande say they are also working out new deal structures for the many business ventures they undertook while at SB — in preparation for their potential departures.
“It might take several years for Bieber to wrap up whatever deals he has with Braun and SB Projects, but he’s still a very attractive client,” says a major talent agent executive unassociated with the artist. “He’s young, he’s a proven superstar and he’s motivated to work and make money.”
Additional reporting by Dave Brooks and Elias Leight.
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Idina Menzel parted with manager Scooter Braun at the beginning of the year, sources close to the situation tell Billboard, adding the actress and recording artist to the growing list of Braun’s clients who have recently departed his management company, SB Projects. Another source says the “amicable” split happened last year. Menzel announced she had […]