Brussels, 11th December 2023

IMPALA welcomes the provisional agreement found on the EU AI Act, which requires general purpose AI models to respect EU copyright law and imposes meaningful transparency obligations on these same models.   

Subject to final details to be agreed at technical level, we believe the AI Act will provide a good basis for our members to be able to engage in proper negotiations for uses of their works by AI companies.   

Once a final text is agreed and fully adopted in the coming months, the AI Act will become the first legislative framework on AI globally, setting a useful precedent for other parts of the world. We look forward to seeing this process through up to its final fruition. 

Our members, European independent music companies, are keen to continue exploring commercial opportunities in the AI space with the right framework in place.  

IMPALA was established in 2000 and now represents nearly 6000 independent music companies. 99% of Europe’s music companies are small, micro and medium businesses and self-releasing artists. Known as the independents, they are world leaders in terms of innovation and discovering new music and artists – they produce more than 80% of all new releases and account for 80% of the sector’s jobs. IMPALA’s mission is to grow the independent music sector sustainably, return more value to artists, promote diversity and entrepreneurship, improve political access, inspire change, and increase access to finance. IMPALA works on a range of key issues for its members, runs various award schemes and has a programme aimed at businesses who want to develop a strategic relationship with the independent sector – Friends of IMPALA.