The battle between Sony and Soundcloud has turned ugly this month as the label has decided to start pull down it's artist's music from the Berlin music service. Among those who have been affected this far include Adele, Miguel, Passion Pit and in the next day or two Madeon. Sony Music partnered with dance music label Ultra Records to help share and promote content in 2013. Ultra Records CEO Patrick Moxey was a speaker at IMS Engage in Ibiza, a conference for electronic music industry folks and he was asked about the conflict between his label parent and Soundcloud. According to Music Week, he backed Sony and spoke rather candidly about the lack of monetization opportunities found on Soundcloud at the moment -- a common theme echoed among labels now.
Moxey reckons that it will take "two or three years" for the Berlin-based company to build out its capability to create revenue with brands for payouts.
He appreciates what the platform symbolizes and the community it has developed, but laments how little money is made from streams.
"I think that SoundCloud is fantastic because there 100,000 creators uploading new music to [the platform] every night, but what do they pay artists and writers right now? Little to nothing. Will they pay anybody anything in the near future? Not really."
"What electronic artists are going to get out of SoundCloud financially in the next few years is close to nothing. Once you realise that then you'll realise that you do have to protect the guys that are trying to pay the artists and the labels."
He praises the steps Spotify has taken to help out artists because, "they are paying the artists, writers and labels properly. They are doing a great job, they are growing exponentially, and picking up over one million paid subscribers a month."
This rhetoric would indicate an end to Ultra Records on Soundcloud soon. It might not be their decision if Sony forces Ultra to remove all of their content from the music service. Doing so would remove content from the likes of Kaskade, Above & Beyond, Axwell, Calvin Harris, Benny Benassi, deadmau5 and many more. Such a move could drive away some artists from the label or make it more difficult to sign new artists who have strong soundcloud followings and don't want to lose them by signing to the Ultra.
UPDATE: According to a Ultra Records spokesperson, Ultra is "very pro-soundcloud and will continue
