Separate lawsuits by Eminem’s publisher and Elvis Presley rightsholders accuse Suno of using copyrighted music without permission and enabling users to imitate Presley’s voice. For a catalogue owner, those allegations turn an AI permission request into two practical questions: what can the service use, and what can a user make with it?
Start with the use, then the output
The first allegation concerns music going into a service without permission. The second concerns an imitation a user can produce through that service. Both may matter to a rightsholder considering an AI agreement, but they describe different conduct. A proposed deal should say whether it covers access to existing music, the user-facing capability, or both.
That distinction also changes the first question to ask. If a company wants access to a catalogue, the owner needs to know which music it seeks and what it intends to do with it. If the company wants to offer an imitation feature, the owner needs to know what a user may request and what the service may return. A broad statement that a catalogue is “licensed for AI” does not answer either question with enough precision to price the permission.
The Suno lawsuits remain allegations. Their useful lesson for a licensing conversation is the structure of the dispute: identify each claimed use separately before deciding what an agreement should permit. A rightsholder can make that distinction without treating a complaint as a ruling or assuming that the two claims will have the same outcome.
Make the payment match the permission
The money question begins after the permitted use is defined. A fee for access to existing music answers a different commercial question from a fee tied to an imitation feature. If an offer combines them, the catalogue owner should ask how the offer values each part. Otherwise, it is difficult to tell which activity the payment covers or whether a later expansion of the service falls within the original deal.
Worldwide digital copyright collections reached EUR 6.57 billion in 2025, rose 27.9% and accounted for 42.4% of collections for creators. Those figures describe money collected for digital copyright use. They do not set an AI licence price. They do show why a catalogue owner needs a clear path from permitted use to payment: a growing digital collections total is useful for a business only when the relevant use can be identified and accounted for.
For an independent label or artist, the immediate decision is whether a proposed payment is understandable at the level of the permission being granted. A single amount might be acceptable, but the agreement should still make its scope clear. If a service seeks access to music and permission for a user-facing imitation capability, ask what happens if it uses one without the other. That question exposes whether the payment terms follow the actual uses or merely attach one price to a broad description.
Review the catalogue before answering
An AI request may arrive as a proposal for a whole catalogue, while the relevant permissions need to be checked release by release. Before accepting the scope of an offer, make a working list of the music included and the permissions the requester wants. The list is a negotiating tool: it lets the owner answer a specific proposal instead of granting access under a phrase whose practical reach is unclear.
Use three checks when reviewing the request:
- Identify the music. Record which catalogue items the company wants to use. Ask it to name any material that falls outside the proposal.
- Describe the capability. Ask what the company will do with that music and what users will be able to create. Treat any imitation feature as an express question.
- Trace the payment. Put a price or payment method beside each permitted activity. Ask what record the company will provide so the owner can check use against the agreement.
These checks do not require a label to predict the outcome of litigation. They require it to decide what it is willing to authorize. That decision becomes easier when the proposed rights, the resulting user activity and the payment can be read together.
Use the dispute as a contract test
The claims against Suno concern both copyrighted music and voice imitation. Before signing an AI deal, an independent rightsholder can use those two descriptions as a test: does the document say which existing music the service may use, and does it address what users may generate? Then check whether the payment terms cover each permission actually requested.
The practical rule is simple: write down the use before pricing it. If the requester cannot describe the music, the capability and the payment path clearly enough for the catalogue owner to check them later, the owner lacks a workable basis for deciding what to grant.
