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General Meeting 2022: Face to face again at last
After a two-year interruption, 17 June marks the day when the 2022 SUISA General Meeting can once again take place with members being present in person and on site at the Bierhübeli in Bern.
Photo: Sibylle Roth
Text by Andreas Wegelin
After a break brought on by the pandemic and for the first time since 2019, SUISA will hold its General Meeting at the Bierhübeli in Bern, allowing its members to participate in person and on site. The members of the cooperative are invited to attend in as large a number as possible and to co-determine the fate of their cooperative.

On Friday, 17 June 2022, at 11 a.m., it will finally be that time again: After a musical introduction by the Bernese electro-swing group Klischée, the President of the Board, Xavier Dayer, will open this yearʼs SUISA General Meeting.

Members will be provided with information about SUISAʼs business performance in the past year and are asked to approve the 2021 annual result (–10% compared to the record year 2019) which was a sign of getting off lightly despite the pandemic. In addition to other statutory business, the securing of financing for online licensing by the subsidiary Mint Digital Services AG and a revision of the Articles of Association to improve corporate governance will also come up for discussion and resolution.

Election of substitutes and deputies, opening message and declaration according to EU Directive

After 10 years on the Board of Directors, publisher member Christian Siegenthaler (management of Patent Ochsner) decided to step down from the board. The board proposes Christian Baumgartner, management consultant and investor, as his successor.

Our new board member elected last year, State Councillor Johanna Gapany, will address the members with an opening message from politics.

Finally, in accordance with the provisions of the EU Directive on collective management organisations and the Liechtenstein Collecting Societies Act (VGG), the declarations of the members of the Board of Directors and the Executive Committee are disclosed for the first time on questions of theirparticipation in SUISA, amount of remuneration/compensation and actual or potential conflicts of interest.

Voting members welcome

The General Meeting is only open to members of the cooperative, i.e. members who are entitled to vote (see info box at the end of the text). These members will receive a written invitation with the registration documents by the end of May by mail. The invitation contains the agenda and additional information on the agenda items and business to be transacted at the General Meeting.

I hope that as many of you as possible will attend the General Meeting and, together with my colleague Irène Philipp Ziebold and my colleague Vincent Salvadé as well as other SUISA staff members, I look forward to exchanging ideas with you. Face to face again, at last.

New criteria for members who are entitled to vote
The SUISA Board of Directors decided in December 2020 to adapt the criteria for members who are entitled to vote. Authors and publishers will be admitted as members with voting rights if they have been SUISA principals for at least one year and had at least CHF 3,000 in royalties paid out to them since their registration. Previously, this amount was CHF 2,000. This change entered into force in 2021.
Furthermore, the contractual membership relationship will be reverted into a mandate relationship if members received less than CHF 3,000 in distribution payments overall for their works during the last ten years.

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