August 21, 2010 – Billboard’s Power Players special feature 30 Under 30 recognizes rising young executives who are driving our business forward with their artistic and business vision. In five previous annual features, 30 Under 30 has spotlighted numerous 20-something executive stars to watch. (Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, then 23, was featured in 2007.)

This year, once again, you helped create this list. Our readers submitted nearly 200 nominations at Billboard.biz. Then a team of Billboard editors reviewed every eligible nomination and numerically ranked the nominees according to their achievements in the past 12 months and the nominees’ leadership within the broader industry, as described in their nomination. The alphabetical 30 Under 30 list here represents the collective wisdom of Billboard’s editors.

As in previous years, it’s notable that many of this year’s honorees are heading their own companies, often in the digital or branding space. Many others are in the touring business, which has proved to be one of the more resilient music industry sectors.

While certainly many outstanding young executives did not make our list, the nominations we received affirmed the wealth of talent rising through the music business, a strong sign of promise for the years ahead.

This year’s 30 Under 30 list:

Ben Cockerham
CFO/chief strategy officer, RightsFlow
Music licensing and royalty payment service provider RightsFlow is a company on the move, led by co-founders Ben Cockerham, who acts as CFO/chief strategy officer, and Patrick Sullivan, who is president. It reported revenue that was up 405% in first-quarter 2010, compared with the same period of 2009, while the number of clients has grown from 1,500 to 10,000. Cockerham, 29, has guided the company into background music, international rights clearance and reporting, master clearance, mobile clearance and user-generated content clearance. As RightsFlow has grown, Cockerham has helped shape industry discussions of copyright in the digital age. A graduate of New York University’s Stern School of Business, Cockerham met Sullivan at eMusic, where they conceived RightsFlow. “We thought there had to be a simpler way to license music and pay royalties,” he says. “And, lo and behold, there was.”
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RightsFlow Providing Full Mechanical Licensing and Administration For Rhapsody’s Digital Music Subscription Service

New York, NY, July 6, 2010 – RightsFlow, a leading provider of licensing and royalty services, announced today an agreement to provide bulk mechanical licensing and administration and reporting support for Rhapsody, the leading online music subscription service.  The deal will provide Rhapsody with additional tools and solutions for mechanical licensing and content management services for publishing rights in the United States.

Rhapsody offers subscribers unlimited on-demand access to more than nine million songs, whether they’re listening on a PC, laptop, internet connected home stereo or TV, MP3 player or mobile phone (including the iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, and Android-powered headsets).  Rhapsody subscribers can access their music through more touch-points than any other digital music service. Read the rest of this entry »

The Internet availability of photographs, illustrations and even webpage designs is hammering small businesses that depend on selling and licensing their intellectual property, creators told the Institute for Policy Innovation’s World IP Day event in Washington Monday. Public ignorance more than intentional malfeasance is the problem, enabled by social networking sites and confusion over the distinction between licensing and ownership, they said. The founder of a rights-clearance service for digital music providers said the poor economy and stalled progress in legislation to revamp licensing was spurring the development of private solutions…

…Two-year-old RightsFlow has done well despite or even because of the economic downturn, said Ben Cockerham, chief operating officer for the company, which clears mechanical royalty rights for digital music services and other entities such as church groups. RightsFlow recently began a direct-to-consumer service, Limelight, that has been “overwhelmingly successful” in collecting payments for song use that otherwise would have been done without permission, he said. Licensing will be increasingly important because of advances in manufacturing technology, such as 3D printers, Cockerham said: “The only thing that would have value is the IP. Read the rest of this entry »

Washington, D.C. April 20, 2010 – Ben Cockerham, RightsFlow’s Chief Operating Officer, will participate in the Fifth Annual World Intellectual Property Day Forum on April 29^th addressing “Intellectual Property’s Impact on Jobs and the Global Economy”.  The conference will take place at the Reserve Officers Association (ROA) Headquarters Minuteman Memorial Building (across from the Dirksen Senate Office Building) on Constitution Avenue in Washington D.C.

Cockerham will provide industry insights and business assessments as part of a panel conversation focused on “Small and Medium Enterprises, IP, Jobs & the Economy.”  Moderated by Dr. Merrill Matthews, IPI Resident Scholar, the panel will take place at 9:50 a.m. on Monday immediately following the keynote address by Marybeth Peters, United States Register of Copyrights, U.S. Copyright Office.

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New York, NY, November 18, 2008 – Benjamin Cockerham has been named COO of New York-based RightsFlow, a company specializing in intellectual property licensing and copyright management.
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September 27, 2008 – If you like complicated puzzles, then the online music royalty situation is right up your alley. A major royalty deal for streaming and limited downloads of music was announced this past week. Online music services, music publishers, and the recording industry all took part to come up with this deal.
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Santa Monica, CA, Sept. 24, 2008 – Lost in the licensing shuffle? After decades of evolution, the modern-day music industry features a myriad of licenses, royalty obligations, specialized societies, and of course, lawsuits. That makes it difficult for entrants and outsiders to understand the tricky terrain, though insiders also sometimes struggle with the complicated maze of royalty requirements.
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A pair of digital music executives are parlaying their rights expertise into a startup consultancy. The group, called RightsFlow Entertainment Group, is headed by ex-Orchard members Patrick Sullivan and Ben Cockerham. The company, which first bubbled last week, is aiming to assist companies lost in the licensing weeds. “With the advent of a myriad of new music industry business models, there is a striking need for clarity and guidance in the matters of creating and obtaining proper licenses as well as practically implementing those licenses,” said Sullivan.
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