LÓPEZ LEADS UNIVERSAL LATIN’S BORDER-CROSSING SUCCESS

Under Jesús López, chairman/CEO at Universal Music Latin America and Iberian Peninsula, the company’s urban-leaning acts continue to chart throughout the globe, fluidly crossing barriers of language and genre.

While J Balvin and fellow Colombian Karol G may be Universal Latin’s most prominent success stories — Karol G scored her first No. 1 on Top Latin Albums with KG0516, the biggest week, by units, for a female-led album on the chart since 2017 — López says the company still thinks locally “so that our artists keep expanding their music outside their countries of origin.”

Via streaming, some of Universal’s brightest and youngest stars — including Colombia’s Sebastian Yatra (managed by Universal-owned GTS); Puerto Rico’s Jhay Cortez, Guaynaa and Feid; and Mexico’s Christian Nodal and Danna Paola — have done just that, achieving revenue-generating stardom. Regional Mexican labels Fonovisa and Disa also revamped their rosters with new signings such as Adriel Favela and his label, Esperanto, and Colombians Yeison Jiménez and Nabález.

And even as their touring was sidelined, legacy artists continued recording. “We are very proud of the achievements by artists who have created and released music during the pandemic, such as Juanes, Gloria Trevi, Alejandro Fernández, Alejandro Sanz and David Bisbal, among others,” says López.

As of Aug. 12, Universal’s U.S. label market share, including Disa and Fonovisa, stood at 24.65%, while as a distributor, it gobbled up a 36.83% market share, including the 5.73% share of Universal Music Group-owned distributor Ingrooves, according to MRC Data.

Beyond the U.S. market, executive vp e-commerce, business development and digital Skander Goucha led the expansion of Universal’s e-commerce business across Latin America and Iberia, and Universal now has direct-to-consumer operations in Brazil, Mexico and Spain, with more countries to launch this year. And CFO/executive vp operations Elsa Yep was instrumental in the launch of Virgin Music in Latin America, bringing that iconic brand to the region.