(Bloomberg) -- Sony Corp. is buying EMI Music Publishing, getting its hands on a catalog of 2.1 million songs from Beyonce, Carole King and other artists as it embarks on a new growth plan built on content and services.

The Japanese company will buy about 60 percent equity interest from a consortium led by from Mubadala Investment Co. for about $2 billion, Sony said in a statement. The Tokyo-based company already owns almost 40 percent of EMI, operates the business and had been in talks to buy the library for the past few months.

EMI’s extensive catalog will solidify Sony’s position as the largest music publisher amid a boom in streaming services that has fueled valuations for music copyrights. The transaction is the first major strategic move by Kenichiro Yoshida, who took over as chief executive officer in April. He is set to unveil a three-year plan later Tuesday that embraces Sony’s growing reliance on income from gaming subscriptions and entertainment.

“We are thrilled to bring EMI Music Publishing into the Sony family and maintain our number one position in the music publishing industry,” Yoshida said in the statement.

Mubadala said the deal is based on an enterprise value of $4.75 billion, exceeding its target of getting at least $4 billion for EMI. That’s double what the Sony-led group, which also includes billionaire David Geffen, paid for the business six years ago. That makes the sale the largest music-industry transaction since the last time EMI changed hands.

Music publishing has long offered owners a steady source of cash, in contrast with the more cyclical recorded music business, which is dependent on hits and retail sales and has historically gone up and down depending on the success of new releases in a given quarter.

Growing paid streaming services from Spotify Ltd. and Apple Inc. have boosted music-industry sales for three years in a row and enticed investors to splurge on catalogs. Labels own the recordings of songs, while publishers own the songs as originally written.

Last month, Sony disclosed that it will record a gain of almost $1 billion from its stake in Spotify following the streaming service’s public debut.

(Updates with detail on EMI value in fifth paragraph.)

To contact the reporter on this story: Yuji Nakamura in Tokyo at ynakamura56@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Robert Fenner at rfenner@bloomberg.net, Reed Stevenson, Andrew Pollack

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