Georgia had 3.12 million internet users at the end of 2025, a penetration rate of 81.9 percent, per DataReportal’s Digital 2026 report. It also has exactly one accredited music royalty society, and that is new.
On 29 December 2023, Sakpatenti, Georgia’s National Intellectual Property Center, granted accreditation to the Intellectual Property Owners Association (IPOA). From 1 January 2024 it became the only body legally able to collect and distribute collective royalties in the country.
The society that had done that job since 1999, the Georgian Copyright Association, was excluded from the competition.
What the reset actually changed
CMO means collective management organisation: the body that licenses public performance and broadcast uses of music, then pays writers and performers.
- Amendments to the Law of Georgia on Copyright and Related Rights entered into force on 26 July 2023, rewriting how CMOs are governed, audited and accredited.
- Sakpatenti opened the accreditation competition on 26 September 2023 with a two-month document window.
- The commission cited IPOA’s five regional offices and 22 staff. The Georgian Copyright Association was disqualified over charter non-compliance; the Georgian Neighbouring Rights Association was not accredited.
- Reciprocal agreements previously held by the old society moved across to the new one.
Five international rights bodies objected in writing
On 12 February 2024, CISAC, IFRRO, IFPI, SCAPR and IMPF co-signed a letter to Sakpatenti. Their objection was about process, not about whether IPOA can do the work.
The letter warned that the decision “stifles competition, potentially harming rights holders by limiting their options to less qualified CMOs,” and asked Georgia to protect the contractual independence of foreign societies.
IFRRO’s separate statement was narrower and sharper: reciprocal agreements and mandates granted to the previous CMO were transferred without negotiation with the overseas societies that granted them.
The file is still open. Sakpatenti’s readout of a 24 April 2025 embassy meeting references unresolved issues between Universal Music Group and the previous CMO, with a UMG visit to Georgia planned.
The recording money was never in that pipe
Public performance is one revenue line, paid in lari against domestic hotel, restaurant and cafe licences. For most working Georgian artists, the recording income arrives from streaming, and it arrives from abroad.
- Spotify launched in Georgia in February 2021. Within the first year Georgian users had built more than 347,000 playlists, according to Caucasus Business Week.
- The local streaming leaders at that point were Dagdagani, LOUDspeakers, Killages and 33a.
- The Georgian names with genuinely international audiences skew classical. Pianist Khatia Buniatishvili’s listenership concentrates in the United States, France and Germany.
That is a currency story as much as a rights story. A stream from Tbilisi and a stream from Paris are not the same money.
The clubs are a third ledger
Tbilisi’s electronic scene is the country’s most visible music export and it sits outside the royalty system entirely.
In late November 2024, Bassiani, KHIDI, Left Bank, Mtkvarze and TES shut indefinitely in solidarity with protests after the government suspended EU accession talks. Within two weeks the clubs were running GoFundMe and PayPal appeals, Resident Advisor reported. Left Bank said that “with our resources depleted and survival at stake, reaching out to our community has become our only option.”
Door revenue does not reach the recording. Distribution does.
What an independent Georgian artist or label should do now
- Register with the accredited society for domestic performance income, but do not model it as your primary revenue line.
- Hold recording rights on a distribution agreement that reports by territory, so you can see which export market is actually paying.
- Deliver beyond Spotify and Apple Music. Diaspora and regional services still carry real Caucasus listening.
- Ask your distributor whether it delivers via DDEX. DDEX means Digital Data Exchange, the standard that keeps your metadata, splits and ISRCs intact as they cross borders.
When a country rewrites its collection rules, the collective pipe goes quiet for a while. The distribution pipe does not. That is the case for keeping masters on a rail that reports by territory and does not depend on which society wins the next accreditation round.
Related reading: Armenia has one copyright society and no law written for it, Kazakhstan moved Q-pop publishing money onto a state platform, and Germany, where techno owns the exports.
