Stibbe successfully represented Sena in supervisory proceedings concerning transparency obligations
In 2018, the Copyright Supervisory Board (College van Toezicht Auteursrechten, “CvTA”) issued a binding instruction to Sena to publish certain agreements with NPO, RPO, and NLPO as standard license agreements and rates on its website. Commercial parties had submitted an enforcement request because they believed that these agreements should be considered standard and therefore fell under the disclosure obligation of Article 2p of the Dutch Supervision Act. Sena believed that individually negotiated agreements were not subject to this disclosure obligation. Furthermore, this broad interpretation of the concept of standard agreements would frustrate Sena's task as representative of rights holders.
The case revolved around the correct interpretation of the term “standard license agreements” in Article 21 of EU Directive 2014/26 on the collective management of copyright, transposed into Article 2p of the Dutch Supervision Act. The key question was whether certain individually negotiated agreements fell within this legal definition. The Administrative Jurisdiction Division of the Council of State upheld Sena's position in its ruling of 11 June 2025 (link): specifically negotiated agreements are logically not standard agreements. Nor do the usual meaning, context, or objectives of the directive call for a different interpretation. The Council also ruled that the agreements in this case are not standard license agreements because they differ from each other, show evidence of negotiation, contain elements tailored to specific parties, and include lump sums that differ from each other.
With this ruling, the CvTA's instruction is definitively off the table. The ruling provides collective management organizations with clarity on the limits of their transparency obligations. In addition, the ruling may provide useful guidance for legal practice regarding the interpretation of EU law concepts.
