Deal sheet
- Status
- Established by Reservoir and PopArabia's own joint newsroom release, dated 6 March 2025, corroborated the same day by an independent trade report (Digital Music News). What is NOT established: the price, the precise legal form of the master-rights transfer, the term, and why Reservoir's own two SEC exhibits covering the fiscal quarter this deal falls in describe it two different ways: a signed publishing deal in the 28 May 2025 filing, a catalogue acquisition in the 4 June 2025 filing.
- Parties
- Reservoir Media, Inc., PopArabia
- Amount
- N/A Not disclosed. Neither Reservoir and PopArabia's 6 March 2025 announcement nor either of Reservoir's two SEC filings covering the same fiscal quarter states a price. Reservoir's FY2025 10-K, covering the same period, does not name Omar Kamal at all, so no per-deal figure can be checked against it either.
- Rights covered
- Reservoir and PopArabia's own newsroom release states the deal "includes both publishing and master rights" to Omar Kamal's catalogue: full ownership of both his recordings and his compositions, not an administration or licensing arrangement. Reservoir's 8-K earnings release for the same fiscal quarter (filed 28 May 2025) instead lists "Omar Kamal" inside a bullet reading "Signed publishing deals with Snoop Dogg and Death Row Records, k.d. lang, Wrabel, Travis Heidelman, Jon Decious, Aaron Zuckerman, Jeff Trott, Lewis Thompson, and Omar Kamal among others," a list the same release otherwise reserves for songwriter administration or co-publishing signings. A second 8-K exhibit for the same quarter (filed 4 June 2025) reverts to "Acquired catalog of Egyptian star Omar Kamal in conjunction with PopArabia." No document obtained specifies whether the master-rights side of the transaction is an outright assignment of copyright or an exclusive licence, and none states a term.
- Territory
- Not stated as a contractual territory in any document obtained. Both companies frame the deal as part of their expansion in Egypt and the wider MENA region; Kamal is an Egyptian artist and PopArabia is Reservoir's MENA subsidiary.
- Announced
- 2025-03-06
- Primary document
- Official newsroom
- Sources
- Reservoir Media's own newsroom, "Reservoir and PopArabia Acquire Catalog of Egyptian Star Omar Kamal," dated 6 March 2025, fetched and read directly · SEC EDGAR, Reservoir Media, Inc. 8-K Exhibit 99.1, "Reservoir Media Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2025 Results," filed 28 May 2025, fetched and read directly · SEC EDGAR, Reservoir Media, Inc. 8-K Exhibit 99.1, investor presentation dated June 2025, filed 4 June 2025, fetched and read directly · SEC EDGAR, Reservoir Media, Inc. 10-K for the fiscal year ended 31 March 2025, filed 28 May 2025, fetched and read directly; does not name Omar Kamal · Digital Music News, 6 March 2025, trade report corroborating the newsroom release in full, including the "both publishing and master rights" language
Read this before citing: Reservoir's 28 May 2025 8-K earnings release (Exhibit 99.1, "Reservoir Media Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2025 Results") lists Omar Kamal inside a sentence otherwise made up of songwriter administration or co-publishing signings: "Signed publishing deals with Snoop Dogg and Death Row Records, k.d. lang, Wrabel, Travis Heidelman, Jon Decious, Aaron Zuckerman, Jeff Trott, Lewis Thompson, and Omar Kamal among others." The same release uses visibly different language for other deals in the same reporting period: "Struck deals for rights to the publishing catalog of Lebo M and recorded music catalog of Jack Douglas" and "Acquired the publishing catalogs of Lastrada Entertainment, Big D Evans, and Billy Strange." Reservoir's 4 June 2025 8-K (Exhibit 99.1, investor presentation) instead places Kamal under "Acquired catalog of Egyptian star Omar Kamal in conjunction with PopArabia," a bullet the same slide keeps distinct from "Announced publishing deal with… El DeBarge." This desk did not find a document resolving which of the three characterisations, full ownership of both rights per the March release, a signed publishing deal per the May filing, or a catalogue acquisition per the June filing, is the operative one, and treats the March joint release as the most specific of the three because it is the only one to name both rights types explicitly. A looser possibility this desk cannot rule out: the May earnings release's bullet may simply be loosely drafted rather than a deliberate reclassification of the deal's structure. Reservoir's FY2025 10-K (filed the same day as the May 8-K, for the period ended 31 March 2025) names Mohamed Ramadan and Nancy Ajram as examples of artists whose catalogues PopArabia has signed or acquired, but does not name Omar Kamal, so the annual report does not resolve which category this deal belongs in either.
