Music Business News: North America

If Universal’s going to go public, Vivendi should strike while the iron’s hot

Why now might be the right time for the French media giant to make its move

Secretly Group restructures marketing department with new hires

Independent label hires Robby Morris from Matador and promotes Hannah Carlen

Lil Wayne receives backing from artist finance firm Sound Royalties

Artist locked in a legal dispute with Cash Money and Universal Music

Vivendi expands ticketing operation in Europe and the US with LiveStyle deal

Ticketing and technology company Paylogic acquired

Windowing on Spotify is finally happening – but is it worth it for the labels?

Spotify gained over $300m from its new deals with labels last year

Universal employed 7,912 people last year – its biggest headcount in a decade

Nearly half of company's employees were women, with 43% of managerial positions taken by female execs

Spotify acquires mechanical licensing tech platform Loudr

Loudr specializes in automatically identifying composer data

Reach Music extends publishing agreement with Ice T

Deal expands upon a 10-year relationship that covers over 300 compositions