About Us

On the 7th of November 2000 founding members of the association agreed on joint objectives and the by-laws of the organisation. One of the fundamental objectives was the establishment of an organisation of collective management of rights of audiovisual works producers or as presently stated in the Slovak Copyright Act of producers of audio and audiovisual recordings (in fact film producers, copyright holders and administrators) in the territory of the Slovak Republic in accordance with the actual copyright regulations and international treaties. Besides representing and defending the rights of Slovak producers and contacts with foreign partners, the whose works were broadcasted (e.g. by cable retransmission) without any remuneration guaranteed by the Copyright Act, this decision was to a large extent influenced by the fact that in that period there was no functioning copyright collecting society. Although the company SLOVGRAM obtained a licence in this field, it was not carrying out its activities, , thus the licence was not functional and SLOVGRAM has never represented Slovak or foreign producers with a specific copyright portfolio (with the exception of producers of music audiovisual recordings – video clips).

On the 11th of July 2001 SAPA applied for the licence and obtained the Licence No. 1/2001 (which became effective on 1 October 2001) for collective rights management in accordance with the Copyright Act No. 283/1997 on collective rights management.

For the first time in the history of the Slovak audiovisual industry, this licence meant the onset of the first organisation of collective management of rights to audiovisual recordings and right of producers of audiovisual works in Slovakia.

At the end of 2013, after various amusing, sad, funny, distressful and enlightened peripeties, SAPA, by the decision of the Ministry of Culture, gained a new licence No. 1/2013 to perform collective management of rights to audiovisual works in the manner that is usual in the countries of the European Union with which SAPA has been not only cooperating for years, but it has been a regular and founding member of relevant collective rights management organisations throughout Europe.

Of course, SAPA is nowadays a member of international collective rights management organisations on all continents.