Udio Aggressively Seeks Dismissal of Independent Artist Lawsuits

Photo Credit: Andrew Santellan

Udio the creator-friendly AI music platform? Not so fast. Though the startup’s been making headlines for its pacts with the majors, Merlin, and most recently Kobalt, behind the scenes, it’s attempting to crush a pair of artist-led lawsuits.

We’ve been covering those complaints – one dating back to June 2025, the other to October – from the outset. And while each action contains unique elements, there’s a good bit of central-argument overlap here.

In short, both suits accuse Udio of ingesting indies’ creative works without authorization – including by allegedly “stream-ripping” protected audio from YouTube – before training its generative models on these same works en route to pumping out derivative creations in response to user prompts.

Bearing in mind the high-stakes actions’ similarities, it won’t come as a surprise that Udio is leaving no stone unturned as it seeks to end the courtroom confrontations. In the newer of the cases, submitted to an Illinois federal court by plaintiffs including Attack the Sound frontman David Woulard, Udio is urging dismissal on jurisdictional grounds.

“Plaintiffs’ inability to cite a single case supporting their position about personal jurisdiction in the era of the internet is telling: there is no support for finding personal jurisdiction over Udio,” the legal text reads.

“No aspect of the model’s training was directed at Illinois, occurred in Illinois, or was influenced by the existence of Illinois subscribers,” the dismissal document continues. “Plaintiffs’ core claims have nothing to do with Illinois.”

On top of this contention, the AI business is looking to end Woulard v. Udio because of its perceived status “as a duplicative case,” referring to an alleged resemblance to the distinct artist-led complaint referenced above. The newer suit “plainly qualifies as a duplicative case under the standards applied in the Seventh Circuit and in this district,” according to Udio.

And in the opposite corner, the musician filing parties are adamant that Udio has significant ties to Illinois, rendering the Prairie State’s courts suitable for the legal battle.

“Udio’s jurisdictional argument rests on a premise the law does not support: that a company may operate a nationwide, subscription-based commercial enterprise—one that repeatedly contracts with Illinois residents, repeatedly bills them, repeatedly performs the core service for them, and repeatedly delivers the resulting product into Illinois—and yet remain immune from suit here because it has no office or employees in the state,” a relevant sentence sums up.

As for Udio’s dismissal strategy in the older of the artist-led class actions – levied by Tony Justice and his 5th Wheel Records – would the showdown be complete without a mention of Cox v. Sony Music?

By now, many are well aware of that unanimous Supreme Court decision’s far-reaching impact; the resulting contributory liability definition is officially factoring into cases involving Meta, Epidemic Sound, X, Anthropic, and several ISPs, among others.

One of the “others”: The Justice-filed complaint, which is facing a contributory infringement dismissal demand from Udio in the wake of Cox.

“Under Cox,” Udio’s letter to the judge states, “Plaintiffs’ allegations of contributory copyright infringement (Count II) are deficient and should be dismissed.”

(The remainder of the letter mostly recaps the Supreme Court’s determination – in brief, that a third-party service provider can be held contributorily liable for users’ alleged infringement only if it induced the infringement or tailored its service to infringement.)

Separately, Udio is also aiming to do away with a DMCA violation claim (concerning the alleged circumvention of anti-piracy measures in connection with stream-ripping) and a claim pertaining to alleged unfair competition infractions.

Specifically when it comes to the Cox-focused effort to nix the contributory infringement claim, however, the plaintiffs are adamant that the decision “addresses a materially different question” than that described by Udio.

Furthermore, the “contributory” descriptor comes from the defendant; technically, though, the referenced amended complaint count relates to direct infringement – a fact underscored by attorney Krystle M. Delgado in a follow-up letter to the court.

“Put simply, Cox does not apply because Plaintiffs do not allege Udio’s users caused the copyright infringement at issue,” Delgado’s retort reads.

“Cox applies to passive neutral intermediaries and does not address platforms that engage in direct, volitional copyright infringement (as alleged in Plaintiffs’ case against Udio). Plaintiffs’ allegations fall outside the scope of Cox, and Udio’s reliance on this decision provides no basis for dismissal of Plaintiffs’ Count II (for direct copyright infringement),” the response proceeds.

Time will tell how the dismissal disputes play out – and whether Cox-prompted arguments surface in Sony Music’s ongoing case against Udio. As we noted yesterday, following Udio settlements with Warner Music and Universal Music, the appropriate docket’s been conspicuously quiet as of late. But technically, Sony Music and Udio are still battling it out.