Universal Music Group Files Multiple AI Patents for Copyright-Controlled Music Derivatives

Music IP Holdings, Inc.

(MIH) was formed to license the technology globally, with UMG filing 15 patents across fields including musical collaboration, multimedia content creation, AI threat protection, and rights management. By November 2025, MIH opened a headquarters on Nashville’s Music Row, with Daniel Drolet serving as Chairman and CEO.

In a November 2025 press release, MIH stated it held more than 60 protected innovations with numerous additional technology families and portfolios under development.

A patent titled ‘AI-GENERATED MUSIC DERIVATIVE WORKS’ was filed on October 24, 2024, and granted on June 3, 2025, originally listing Daniel Drolet as the sole inventor. A subsequent expanded continuation, assigned to MIH and currently pending, was filed in August 2025 and adds Chris Horton, Jeremy Uzan, and Sion Elliott as co-inventors alongside Drolet.

Chris Horton is EVP, Strategic Technology at UMG; Jeremy Uzan is Director, AI and Advanced Technology at UMG; and Sion Elliott is Director, Global New Business Strategy at Universal Production Music.

The abstract in the updated continuation filing describes a system and method for creating AI-generated derivative works from predetermined content with copyright compliance and content owner control. The system receives predetermined content and a user-requested transformation theme, then employs generative artificial intelligence to create a derivative work.

The system may enable scalable rights management for AI-generated content across music, video, text, and other media formats.

Another patent, ‘MULTI-STAGE APPROVAL AND CONTROLLED DISTRIBUTION OF AI-GENERATED DERIVATIVE CONTENT,’ was filed on May 2, 2025, and granted on September 23, 2025, naming Chris Horton, Jeremy Uzan, Sion Elliott, and Daniel Drolet as inventors. It describes a method combining a machine-learning approach with predefined rule sets established by content owners that specify permissible and impermissible transformations for specific content.

The patent includes a two-stage approval process: one check before the AI generates anything, another on the finished output.

It refers to pre-generation preference data and post-generation preference data associated with a content authority, defined as any entity having legitimate control, decision-making power, or governance rights over digital or creative content and its permissible transformations, including a natural person such as an artist, creator, or designated individual, as well as legal entities and rights management organizations.

The filing provides an example where if an artist is vegetarian and does not want their voice or style used in songs about meat consumption, this preference can be captured by their label ahead of time and provided to the content derivation platform.

It also describes a feature allowing users to replace lead vocals in an existing recording with the voice of another artist who has consented to such transformations.

The selection action may trigger the attribution and remuneration system, ensuring appropriate compensation to both original and substitute artists. The patent sets out distribution controls that prevent unauthorized use of derivatives on third-party platforms, with partner platforms including streaming services, social networks, and distribution aggregators contractually required to scan incoming content for markers and take automated enforcement action based on encoded rules.

The filing describes context-restricted playback, where transformed works are only accessible within the approved media environment.

It also outlines automated revenue distribution via a smart contract that allocates revenue from each authorized distribution of the derivative work to stakeholders identified in the usage registry, triggered each time the digital identifier is verified during a streaming session.

A third patent, ‘AI-GENERATED DERIVATIVE CONTENT SCALING FOR MERCHANDISE,’ was filed on October 3, 2025, and is pending, naming Horton and Uzan as inventors. It applies to AI-generated album artwork derivatives, apparel designs, posters, and virtual goods, all under the same governance framework as the audio filings.

The fan-facing side of the system is designed around a five-step journey on a mobile app, with the backend pulling from a library of artist reference materials including artist logos, artist fonts, lyrics and text, album art, and tour visuals. The fan’s request passes through two AI components: a knowledge agent that checks it against the rightsholder’s brand guidelines and an action agent that runs the generative AI and produces the design.

The design then goes through an approval check: if it fails, it’s rejected; if it passes, it moves on to fulfillment.

Physical merchandise is routed to a print agent that feeds a print-on-demand partner and a shop agent that lists the product on an e-commerce storefront, while virtual merchandise takes a separate path to a 3D rendering engine and metaverse platforms.

Both tracks feed into a contract that distributes revenue to stakeholders. The platform operates in real time during live events, with concert-synchronized merchandise generation pulling in data about the song being played, stage visuals, lighting, crowd engagement, and venue location to produce context-specific items.

Fan co-creation interfaces check each modification against brand rules in real time, and authentication combines physical elements like holographic tags or QR codes with embedded digital identifiers. MIH claims more than 60 protected innovations, suggesting the portfolio extends beyond the derivative works family into other fields including musical collaboration, music and health, and AI threat protection.

On April 8, 2026, at the HumanX conference, Michael Nash, UMG’s EVP and Chief Digital Officer, referenced UMG’s AI patent activity.

' On UMG’s Q2 2025 earnings call in July 2025, Chairman and CEO Sir Lucian Grainge noted that the technology underpinning Sound Therapy is not the only tech built in-house using AI. ' The music industry is debating how AI-generated derivatives of existing music should be created, licensed, and monetized. Universal Music Group has championed a walled garden model for AI derivatives.

Universal Music Group settled with Udio in October 2025, where AI-generated music cannot be downloaded or distributed outside the platform on which it was created. Michael Nash argued that without restrictions, AI derivatives risk allowing users to effectively use artists’ content and their brand to create derivatives where you’re going to compete with the artist on other platforms.

UMG and Sony Music are pursuing litigation against Suno.

Paul Sinclair, Chief Music Officer at Suno, advocated for open studios, not walled gardens. Warner Music Group struck a deal with Suno in November 2025 that preserved users’ ability to download their creations. In February 2026, Spotify Co-CEO Gustav Söderström said the streaming giant’s technology to let fans make AI-generated remixes and covers was ready, but that the absence of a rights framework was holding things up.