Background
The defendant operates a senior-living and nursing facility whose care section contains 91 rooms occupied on a permanent basis by 89 residents. Using its own satellite reception equipment, the facility received television and radio programming and transmitted it simultaneously, completely, and without alteration through its internal cable network to connections in residents’ rooms.
The plaintiff, a licensed collecting society acting for the broadcasters concerned, maintained that this retransmission required a license. The Frankenthal Regional Court granted an injunction, but the Zweibrücken Higher Regional Court reversed and dismissed the action because it considered the residents a stable, homogeneous group rather than a public. After proceedings were stayed pending a related preliminary ruling from the Court of Justice of the European Union, the collecting society sought reinstatement of the injunction before the Federal Court of Justice.
The Court’s Holding
The Federal Court of Justice rejected the collecting society’s appeal and left the dismissal of the action in place. It held that the facility’s simultaneous, unaltered, and complete distribution of broadcasts through its internal cable network did not constitute a communication to the public under Article 3(1) of Directive 2001/29/EC and therefore did not infringe the broadcasters’ retransmission right under Sections 20, 20b(1), and 87(1) of the German Copyright Act.
The Court did not endorse the appellate court’s reasoning that the residents were not a “public.” It considered the transmission an intentional act of communication and indicated that the residents could constitute an indeterminate group of potential recipients. Nevertheless, applying the CJEU’s April 30, 2026 judgment in C-127/24, VHC 2 Seniorenresidenz, the Court found two other requirements absent: the internal cable distribution used no specific technical process distinct from the original broadcast, and it reached no “new public.” Permanent residents receiving broadcasts privately in their rooms belonged to the audience contemplated when the original broadcasts were authorized. The facility’s limited short-term-care accommodation did not alter that assessment, and its dining and common rooms merely extended residents’ private sphere.
Key Takeaways
- Simultaneous, complete, and unaltered distribution of satellite broadcasts through a senior residence’s internal cable network does not, by itself, employ a distinct technical process requiring separate authorization.
- Residents whose rooms serve as their permanent homes are not a “new public,” even though the facility supplies nursing and other services.
- The broadcasters’ cable-retransmission right remains enforceable where retransmission reaches a new public, but it was not infringed on these facts.
Why It Matters
The ruling limits copyright and neighboring-right licensing claims against senior residences that distribute ordinary broadcasts through internal cable systems to permanent residents. It also clarifies that the decisive analysis concerns the transmission technology and whether a new public is reached—not merely whether an operator deliberately supplies signals to numerous recipients.
The Court further confirmed that German broadcasters’ retransmission rights must be interpreted consistently with the EU concept of communication to the public. A tariff or licensing practice directed at senior-care facilities cannot itself establish that residents constitute a new public.