Meanwhile, in Brazil...

In almost all countries music copyright societies and neighbouring rights societies work separately from one another. In a way they compete, in that music users receive invoices both for the public use of compositions and recordings.

However, in Brazil the situation is entirely different. Since 1973, there is just one entity (ECAD) that collects from music users for both types of rights whilst there are 7 main collectives, i.e. ABRAMUS, AMAR, ASSIM, SBACEM, SICAM, SOCINPRO and UBC (each of which are members of ECAD) which take care of the distribution of the monies collected by ECAD towards their members.

The collectives may have slightly different internal workflows, but they all have to respect and abide by the rules voted on by themselves in general assemblies and enforced by ECAD. They all pay out monthly (less frequent in case of international distributions) and their administration fees are identical.

With respect to royalty payouts, this is all dependent on the amounts collected and made available by ECAD as well as the timely claiming by the collectives. The competition between the collectives is in fact occurring at the level of royalty distributions and service.

The costs charged by ECAD amount to 10% whilst the 7 collectives are allowed to charge another 5% for the work they do for their members. The higher the amount they distribute, the more fees they earn. Currently, the two biggest collectives are ABRAMUS and UBC.