NCS Wins $1.9M Interim Payment Amid AEI Contract Dispute

Ahead of a high-stakes trial, “the largest copyright-free record label in the world,” NoCopyrightSounds (NCS), has secured a £1.4 million (currently $1.9 million) pre-interest interim payment in its contract dispute with AEI Music.

The UK’s High Court just recently handed down the multimillion-dollar judgment, which Simkins, repping NCS, touted in a release. As is so often the case in the music world, the courtroom confrontation is straightforward enough at the top level but convoluted beneath the surface: the electronic label alleges that AEI owes it millions after their distribution and publishing tie-up turned sour.

Under said tie-up, AEI was to exploit the NCS catalog (containing “over 1500 songs across various moods and genres and generating over 500 billion plays globally,” according to the appropriate website) in exchange for a piece of the resulting revenue.

Throw in AEI’s partial ownership of NCS – AEI’s namesake parent is said to still possess a 25.25% stake in NCS – multiple contracts, the allegedly due payments, several counterclaims, and uncertainty as to which pacts are governing the (former) professional relationship, and you’re left with a recipe for an ugly legal battle.

By the numbers, NCS is pointing to about $8.58 million/£6.49 million in owed payments from AEI, which, unsurprisingly, contests the “overinflated or unreliable” figure but nevertheless acknowledges an outstanding balance.

Additionally, with NCS having moved to nix the underlying deals in September 2025 – incidentally, AEI’s payments have been on hold since December 2025, and exploitations have been paused since the top of 2026 – AEI is seeking relief for breach of contract (“from NCS contracting with third parties”) and unjust enrichment.

At the intersection of all these facts – this is, of course, an overview of the multifaceted showdown – the High Court, citing AEI’s own accounts, identified “a running balance in favour of NCS from AEI of US$6,126,037.43” as of March 31st.

From that total, the presiding judge deducted an NCS-calculated maximum counterclaim value of $4.04 million/£3.06 million (AEI “failed to put forward in their evidence any alternative figures”) to arrive at the initially mentioned $1.9 million/£1.4 million pre-interest interim payment.

Why order preliminary compensation if a trial is tentatively scheduled to take place in early 2028? Besides the lengthy window at hand and AEI’s own books showing evidence of due payments, the High Court reiterated NCS’s concerns that the defendants “are incurring significant legal costs in these proceedings.”

“NCS is concerned that the Defendants have no intention of repaying their debts to NCS,” the court continued, “and that upon NCS receiving a judgment for a substantial sum at trial, AEI and [its publishing arm] Featherstone will simply be wound up.”

In any event, Simkins underscored that NCS intends to push back against the counterclaims and seek “the payment of a debt (or damages) plus interest of an additional circa £5 million, plus a full account,” at trial.