Tag Archives: spotify

iHeartMedia INC.

Link

by Michael Rubloff

 

Contact Information:

iHeartMedia INC.                                                                                                                 200 East Basse Road,                                                                                                     San Antonio, Texas, 78209                                                                                                 (210) 822-2828

Company History

iHeartMedia INC. was founded in 1972 with the purchase of a first FM channel in San Antonio under the name of Clear Channel Communications. iHeartMedia expanded over the course of thirty years, and by 1995 owned forty-three radio stations. However, with the Telecommunications Act of 1996, iHeartMedia radically expanded and added several stations. Currently, iHeartMedia owns eight hundred-fifty radio stations in the United States that reaches 150 markets. In September 2014, Clear Channel Communications rebranded itself as iHeartMedia INC. [1]

Clear Channel Logo

Clear Channel Logo [2]

iHeartMedia INC. logo

iHeartMedia INC. logo [3]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On September 16th, 2014 Clear Channel made a massive commitment to the future by rebranding to iHeartMedia INC. The former name Clear Channel was derived from an AM channel and is no longer relevant. iHeartRadio however, is a massive source of entertainment for millions of people. iHeartMedia better reflects what Clear Channel had built and its goals for the future. iHeartMedia also felt that its name was not well known compared to other services such as Spotify and Pandora even though iHeartRadio provided millions of people everyday with entertainment. This move was made in order to make the brand and the product more synonymous with each other.

 

Corporate Leaders:

Robert Pittman, Chairman and CEO of iHeartMedia INC. [2]

Robert Pittman, Chairman and CEO of iHeartMedia INC. [4]

Richard J. Bressler, President and CFO of iHeartMedia INC. [2]

Richard J. Bressler, President and CFO of iHeartMedia INC. [4]

Wendy Goldberg- Executive Vice President and Chief Communications Officer

Wendy Goldberg, Executive Vice President and CCO of iHeartMedia INC. [4]

GayleTroberman, Executive Vice President and CMO

Gayle Troberman, Executive Vice President and CMO of iHeartMedia INC. [4]

John Sykes, President of Entertainment Enterprises

John Sykes, President of Entertainment Enterprises of iHeartMedia INC. [4]

Financials:

iHeartMedia is a publically traded company in the OTC market (IHRT). Over the past year the stock has remained relatively stable with a year low of $6.10 and a high at $9.40. The high occurred in the week after the announcement of the rebranding to iHeartMedia.[5] Previously, the ticker for Clear Channel was CCO. In its third quarter report, iHeartMedia reported that revenues were up three percent to 1.6 billion dollars. [6]

Past Six Months of Stock Values of iHeartMedia [3]

Past Six Months of Stock Values of iHeartMedia [5]

Competitors:

iHeartMedia’s long-standing rivals have been CBS Radio and Cumulus Media. However, in the past ten years with the emergence of Satellite Radio, Sirius XM has taken over as iHeartMedia’s biggest rival in terms of revenue. iHeartMedia has permeated SiriusXM, as two of the stations featured on SiriusXM, Z100 and Kiis 102.7, are owned by iHeartMedia.

Pandora Logo

Pandora Logo [7]

Now that iHeartMedia is putting a focus on its online music service, iHeartRadio, it now competes with Spotify, Pandora, iTunes Radio, and Google Play. In this field iHeartRadio has a great deal of catching up to do as Spotify and Pandora dominate the online streaming market.

However, iHeartMedia has an advantage over its competitors because it crosses over multiple platforms. For instance, Other radio giants such as Cumulus or Sirius are limited to their radio stations. On the other hand, Pandora and Spotify are limited to their apps or their website. iHeartMedia is able to cross between these two platforms in order to better serve their customers desires. Because of this, it is able to capitalize on where its competitors are limited.

Events:

iHeartMedia is known for its excellence in creating live events directly catered to specific demographics. On October 2nd, it announced the first ever iHeartRadio Fiesta Latina, a massive concert aimed at Latin music fans.[8] It took place on November 22nd, and was a massive success. This experimental event seems to have been a good investment for iHeartMedia as their Spanish and English radio stations reach “93 percent of Hispanics monthly” [9]. 

iHeartRadio Fiesta Latina logo

iHeartRadio Fiesta Latina logo [10]

The Fiesta Latina is the newest addition to iHeartMedia’s collection of live events including the Jingle Ball Concert Tour, Country Festival, and the iHeartRadio Music Festival. While it remains to be seen if the Fiesta Latina will be made into an annual event, it most likely will given its success. One week later, on October 9th, the lineups and locations of the iHeartRadio Jingle Ball Tour were announced. This annual tour has become one of the year’s most exciting events. The tour will begin on Sunday, November 30th and finish on Monday, December 22nd. This event is supposed to cater to listeners of the top40 stations on iHeartRadio and reflect what listeners want to see. This year the New York City concert will be streamed exclusively on Yahoo.com for fans who are unable to attend.[11]

October 2014:

October was a busy month for iHeartMedia as it made several business announcements. On October 7th, iHeartMedia announced a $200 million partnership with Omnicom to develop a multi platform device that will give insight into iHeartMedia’s events as well as technologies.[12]

While this will help Omnicom better target customers, the real winner is iHeartMedia. This deal is dangerous for iHeartMedia’s competitors because this project will allow iHeartMedia to see how it can improve on its multi platform features. Essentially, iHeartMedia will continue to widen the gap between what Pandora and Cumulus are able to do. This will help iHeartMedia become a more versatile company and extend its already industry leading reach.[12]

The next day on October 8th, iHeartRadio announced that it would be available on Android Wear beginning on October 15th. This represents another step forward for the integration of iHeartRadio in technology as iHeartRadio had already announced integration with “Amazon’s Fire Phone, Amazon’s Fire TV, Android Auto, Google’s Chromecast, Apple’s CarPlay, Samsung’s Gear 2 Smartwatch, Qualcomm’s AllPlay and new auto partnerships with Subaru, AT&T Drive, GM, Jaguar Land Rover, Kia and Volvo” [13] earlier this year. By spreading across to different manufacturers, iHeartMedia makes itself more accessible, convenient, and well known. This strategy is directly reflective of the rebranding because it exposes more users to the services provided by iHeartMedia.

iHeartMedia did not stop there. On October 15th, Gayle Troberman was named the Chief Marketing Officer of iHeartMedia. This is a new role created with the intention to “connect them (iHeartMedia) more closely to consumers, helping integrate the company’s brands, products and platforms even more deeply into consumers’ daily lives.” [14] This is necessary after the rebranding because it will decrease the amount of time needed for consumers to become familiar with the iHeartMedia brand. This is a fantastic idea and could pay off exponentially for iHeartMedia in the coming years. iHeartMedia is doing a fantastic job of identifying what it needs to improve and is taking logical steps to ensure it remains an industry leader.

 

What’s in the future:

In the next year, iHeartMedia hopes to continue to reach more customers through social media, live events, and radio. It hopes that its customers will become familiar with the iHeartMedia brand and be able to connect it to popular music events, radio stations, and the iHeartMusic application.

iHeartMedia has embraced the change that is coming to the industry and appears to pioneering the way for other companies to follow it. While the long term effects of rebranding remain to be seen, it has initially been successful. In the next half year, look for iHeartMedia’s competitors to try and catch up with the ability to move across platforms.

 

 

Resources

[1] Clear Channel Becomes iHeartMedia. Published September 16, 2014. Accessed November 22nd.

[2] Clear Channel Logo. Published June 26, 2012. Accessed November 29th.

[3] iHeartMedia INC. Logo. Date Published N/A. Accessed November 29th.

[4] Corporate Team. Date Published N/A. Accessed November 22nd.

[5] Stock Information. Updated Daily. Accessed November 29th.

[6] Financial Report. Published October 28th, 2014. Accessed November 22nd.

[7] Pandora Logo. Date Published N/A. Accessed November 22nd.

[8] iHeartMedia Fiesta Latina Announcement. Published October 2nd, 2014. Accessed October 30th.

[9] iHeartMedia Factsheet. Date Published N/A. Accessed November 22nd.

[10] iHeartRadio Fiesta Latina Logo. Published November 22nd. Accessed November 29th

[11] Jingle Ball Tour. Published October 9th. Accessed November 22nd.

[12] iHeart Media Omnicom Partnership. Published October 7th, 2014. Accessed November 22nd.

[13] iHeartRadio Android Wear Integration. Published October 8th, 2014. Accessed November 22nd.

[14] Gayle Troberman named iHeartMedia’s Chief Marketing Officer. Published October 15, 2014. Accessed November 22nd.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Spotify

Posted on by 
By Hannah D Friedland
[1]

[1] Spotify’s Logo

THE SPOTIFY STORY:

[6] The most updated visuals of the Spotify application on thee platforms

[2] The most updated visuals of the Spotify application on thee platforms. Users have an on-demand stream of music on their computer, mobile device, tablet, and home entertainment system.

Spotify is a music streaming service that puts users in control of 20 million licensed songs [3]. Spotify was launched in Sweden in 2008 and came to America in 2011.

Spotify is financially a private company that offers over 20,000 new songs each day from major and independent labels including EMI, Warner Music Group, Universal, & The Orchard [3]. Artists earn royalty when their music is played, and there are over 24 million active users currently in 55 markets [3].

There are two revenue streams, free, which is “powered by advertisers” and premium for $9.99 monthly with extra features including no ads, offline, and high-quality audio [3].

TEAM SPOTIFY:

[2] Spotify Founders- Daniel Ek & Martin Lorentzon

[4] Spotify Founders- Daniel Ek & Martin Lorentzon

Chief Sales, Marketing, and International Growth Officer- Jeff Levick

[5] Chief Sales, Marketing, and International Growth Officer- Jeff Levick

 

[5] Chief Content Officer & Managing Director USA- Ken Parks

[6] Chief Content Officer & Managing Director USA- Ken Parks

[7] Head of Content- Steve Savoca

[7] Head of Content- Steve Savoca

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

INSIDE SPOTIFY:

Social Media Merges with Music- Songs, playlists, and albums can be shared on the Spotify application through the "Send To" message option, or users can "post to feed" to their Facebook timeline, Twitter, and Tumblr within the Spotify application. ARROW

Social Media Merges with Music- Using the “send to”, or “post to feed” options users can message music to friends and post music to their Facebook timeline, Twitter, and Tumblr within the Spotify application. Source:  Spotify

 

Spotify gives its users the option to connect with their social media Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr accounts. Users can create collaborative playlists, share music, view friends music and more which provides for ample music discovery and publicity for the company on social media platforms. There is also a private session users can activate.

 

 

Two other elements that Spotify includes are apps and Discover. While these apps add dimension to the Spotify journey, Discover is essentially a constantly updated news feed.

Discover- Spotify's "news feed" feature on the desktop application, artists are recommended, concerts nearby are posted, friends listening habits are shown all based on listening habits the user has shown. Source: Spotify

Discover- Spotify’s “news feed” feature on the desktop application. Updates with releases, playlists, artists recommendations, concerts nearby are posted, friends listening habits are shown all based on listening habits the user has shown. Source:  Spotify

COMPETITORS:

Spotify is a strong contender, but it’s competing neck and neck with Rdio, Pandora, Rhapsody, Google Play Music, and Beats on price, catalogue, platforms, and features [8]. Beats Music entered the competitive on-demand music market in January [9], and is Spotify’s biggest challenger.

Beats vs. Spotify

[10] Beats Music vs. Spotify- The two streaming services are extremely similar with the same catalogue size, the discovery element, and price.

Beats entry in the market put Spotify in “go-mode”.

SPOTIFY’S SITUATION:

Competitor streaming services are continually emerging. With more choices presented to consumers, Spotify has responded by shifting their focus to partnerships, acquisitions, customer satisfaction, and updated product development. The formula is to attract users to Spotify, engage with users, and retain them.

Partnerships

Last.fm

Last.fm is a music recommendation service. In January, Spotify and Last.fm teamed up to bring a beneficial on-demand playbar to Last.fm’s website. This makes it possible for Last.fm users to internally play the entire Spotify catalogue on Last.fm’s website [11].

The collaboration works in both companies favor. Last.fm users have a fuller experience with the power, “to play whatever you want by whoever you want directly on Last.fm” [12]. In addition, Spotify’s catalogue incorporation provides a huge presence and Last.fm users conveniently have motivation to signup for Spotify to take advantage of the essential music player.

The Last.Fm playbar

The Last.Fm Spotify playbar at the bottom of Last.Fm’s website. Source:  Lastfm.com

SoundHound

Spotify also joined forces with SoundHound for the “Add to spotify” feature on its iOS application in February. SoundHound is a popular music-recognition app, similar to Shazam. Banded together, SoundHound is now more interactive. After linking accounts, with the tap of a button users can automatically generate Spotify playlists of recognized songs without leaving SoundHound’s app [13]. 

Source: SoundHound & Spotify

Hitting the “Add to Spotify” button automatically turns songs discovered on SoundHound into a Spotify playlist. Source:  SoundHound & Spotify

The mutually-beneficial relationship brings life to identified songs through Spotify playlists on SoundHoud, and the incentive to use the button will drive users to subscribe to Spotify while giving them presence on a music app [14].

Coachella

On top of that, Spotify was presented with an amazing opportunity to have presence on site at Coachella as the Official Digital Music Partner of the Coachella Music and Arts Festival in California in April. The Spotify Social tent was an on-site air-conditioned tent that offered relaxation pods, chargers, a “Mosaic Photo Booth” that uses your Spotify account to generate a picture out of your most played album art, and art from artist Apex [15].

k

[16] The Spotify Social tent, that capped at 150, gave people an air conditioning experience filled with music, more battery power, art,  and a Mosaic Photobooth that puts your face on album covers based on your Spotify listening habits.

#WeWereThere was Spotify’s digital interactive strategy at Coachella to “connect, collect, share.” Implanted in every RFID wristband was the power to capture the experience by checking in and collecting custom Spotify curated playlists. The “My Coachella Story” digital snapshot let individuals create memories of their festival concert experiences with playlists gathered [16]. This collaboration not only transformed Coachella goers into premium users, but also created a special experience and built relationships by reliving the festival on Spotify.

[15] “My Coachella Story”- an example of a digital snapshot that shoes distance traveled, the path taken, playlists, artists seen etc. To participate users needed to simply connect their wrist band with their Spotify accounts, look for check ins at the festival, use the wristband to collect playlists and then after generate their digital card and share it with family and friends.

Sprint

Lastly, Beats launched with an AT&T package family plan deal. Rumors are circulating about Spotify planning to bundle with the #3 U.S. mobile carrier, Sprint [17] in April. This partnership will give Sprint customers a free trial. Customers will be able to pay for Spotify directly through their Sprint Accounts, which will help Spotify secure a greater market share and Sprint secure more data plans. Sprint and Spotify will announce the details on April 29th at a New York Event [18].

Acquisitions

In efforts to boost the “discovery” element, Spotify acquired The Echo Nest in March [19]. The Echo Nest is a music intelligence company that examines listening behavior and makes musical recommendations. Spotify paid $100 Million, with 90% Spotify equity [20]. The Echo Nest previously powered Rdio and Rhapsody, both of which ended their deals, deeming its technology invaluable to their operations right after Spotify acquired [21]. This potentially puts Spotify in the position to take The Echo Nest away from competitors.

Combing the two companies gives The Echo Nest a bigger audience and catalog, while Spotify, now with music-discovery data, will improve recommendation’s.

Customer Satisfaction

With intentions to obtain more paying users Spotify has updated its business model. In January the company announced free music shuffling on iOS with a catch, non-premium users ads play in between every few tracks [22]. In February, Spotify added the “repeat one” feature [23]. Repeat one grants users the option to repeat a single track over and over [24]. These highly requested changes illustrate that Spotify cares about users.

Working with a college students budget, Spotify slashed the premium $9.99 monthly rate to $4.99 in March [25]. They partnered with SheerID to validate eligibility. This price change is valuable because college students represent an important key demographic in streaming use [26]. This differentiates Spotify from other streaming services like Rdio and Beats that charge $10 monthly.

Unique Product Development

Competition among streaming services leads Spotify to completely redesign its user interface layout on all platforms. Spotify rolled out a sleek modernized look on April 2nd. This major design update was the first since its launch in 2008, and to keep current it was a smart move [27].

Spotify’s New Look Video [28] 

The new dramatic, dark color scheme highlights important buttons, includes circular images for people, and features square album shapes [29]. The browse tab is revised and categorized between top lists, releases, news, and moods. “Your Music”, a collection of users saved albums, songs, and artists is a new addition [30]. The Your Music addition mimics iTunes library and it is comparable to Rdio’s “collection” feature. It helps users save, organize, and browse through their favorite music. The new layout feels unified and balanced, and should attract new users [31].

WHATS NEXT FOR SPOTIFY:

Spotify is headed in the right direction, but with downloads declining, new rival services like YouTube, Apple, and Amazon that have huge user bases are joining the streaming market [32].

Being active puts Spotify in the forefront, which looks great for Investors. It is rumored that an IPO is in Spotify’s near future. Though the company has declined all comments, a job advertisement for an “External Reporting Specialist” has been posted on their website and LinkedIn [33]. Their future looks competitive but successful.

Sources: 

1. Spotify’s Logo 2014, Spotifypress.com, RT: 4/04/2014

2. Spotify’s Application on Three Platforms, Spotifyblog.com, RT: 4/01/2014

3. Spotify Press Fast Facts, Press.Spotify.com,  RT: 4/01/2014

4.The Founders of Spotify, Press.Spotify.com, RT: 4/01/2014

5.Spotify’s Chief Sales, Marketing, and International Growth Officer, Press.Spotify.com, RT: 4/01/2014

6. Chief Content Officer & Managing Director USA,Press.Spotify.com, RT: 4/01/2014

7. Head of Content, Press.Spotify.com, RT: 4/01/2014

8. “And The Winner Is… Best Music On-Demand Streaming Service”, Cultofmac.com, 2/18/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

9. “Beats Music Is Here”, Beats Music Blog 1/16/2014, RT: 4/08/2014

10. “Beats Music vs. Spotify: Can Dr. Dre outmix the king of streaming”, Digital Trends, 1/27/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

11. “Last.fm Bands up with Spotify to offer on-demand tracks”, CNET, 1/29/2014, RT: 4/04/2014

12. “Did Someone Say On Demand?”, Last.fm Blog, 1/29/2014, RT: 4/04/2014

13. “SoundHound Launched “Add to Spotify”, Business Wire, 2/21/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

14. “SoundHound Now Lets You Easily Add Your Discovered Music to Your Spotify Playlist”, appdevice.com, 2/24/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

15. “Coachella here we come” Spotify News, 4/7/2014 RT: 4/14/2014

16. “Spotify’s Coachella #WeWereThere Campaign: High Tech and Sweet, Sweet Air Conditioning”, Billboard, 4/11/2014, RT: 4/14/2014

17. “Sprint and Spotify Plan to Partner Up”, recode.net, 4/11/2014, RT: 4/14/2014

18. “Spotify, Sprint Plan Music Bundle To Be Unveiled This Month”, Billboard, 4/12/2014, RT: 4/14/2014

19.“Spotify Acquires the Echo Nest”, Billboard, 3/06/2014, RT: 4/02/2014

20. “Spotify Acquired Music Tech Company The Echo Nest in A $100M Deal” , TechCrunch, 3/07/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

21. “Rhapsody Kills its Echo Nest partnership following Spotify acquisition”, Venturebeat.com, 3/21/2014, RT: 4/09/2014

22. “Spotify’s free shuffle mode arrives on iPhone”, The Verge,1/08/2014, RT: 4/02/2014

23. “Repeat One”, Spotify News Blog, 2/07/2014, RT: 4/08/2014

24. “Spotify users can now repeat the same song over and over and over again”, Hypbot, 2/10/2014, : 4/02/2014

25. “Spotify Offers 50% Student Discount”, Hypbot, 3/25/2014, RT: 4/02/2014

26. “Spotify introduces 50% discount for college students”, Los Angles Times, 3/25/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

27. “The Good, The Bad, The Less Ugly: Taking Spotify’s New Redesign For a Test Drive”, Billboard, 4/03/2014, RT: 4/04/2014

28. Spotify Paints It Black with New Look, YouTube, 4/01/2014, RT: 4/06/2014

29. “Spotify’s biggest redesign ever brings long awaited Collection view”, The Verge, 4/02/2014, RT: 4/07/2014

30. “Spotify paints it black with new look”, Spotify News, 4/02/2014, RT: 4/08/2014

31. “Spotify beautifies”, CNET, 4/02/2014 RT: 4/08/2014

32. “Spotify faces challenge from Internet giants before IPO” New York Post, 3/30/2014, RT: 4/14/2014

33. “Spotify seeks to hire U.S. filings expert as bankers eye IPO” Reuters, 2/17/2014, RT: 4/14/2014

Rdio

Posted on by 
By Karly Brecher

rdio-logoRdio, Inc.
1550 Bryant Street
San Francisco, CA 94103

Phone: 415-763-7211
Website: Rdio.com

Company Overview

Rdio is a privately-owned online music streaming service. Skype founders, Janus Friis and Niklas Zennström launched the company in 2010. Rdio is now available in over 35 countries. The service is ad-supported but users can opt for an ad-less subscription for $9.99 per month. Rdio can be accessed via the internet, desktop client, mobile app, and some in-home entertainment services (ex: Roku, Sonos.)  [1] [2]

Key Executives [3]

AnthonyBay_Rdio

Anthony Bay, Chief Operating Officer

Niklas Zennström

Niklas Zennström, Founder

Janus Friis

Janus Friis, Founder

Scott Bagby

Scott Bagby, Head of Strategic and International Partnerships

Finances

Rdio is a privately owned company and does not disclose their financial information online. Assumptions about the company’s financial well-being can be concluded from news published online. Rdio laid off approximately 35 employees (1/3 of the staff) this past November. A spokesperson for the company said the offs were in order to create a more efficient cost structure and to promote a sustainable business model. This insinuated that Rdio’s finances were weak. However, in March of 2014, Spotify acquired Dhingana, an India-based music streaming service for an undisclosed amount. This indicates that Rdio is trying to expand and must be doing better financially. [4] [5]

Competitors

subscriptionservices

Paying subscribers of top streaming services. Image courtesy of Digital Music News.

Rdio is not the only streaming service fighting for domination in the United States, in fact, their market share is very small compared to competitors (but, their numbers are still growing.) Rdio has many domestic and international competitors.  The graph to the left shows the number of paying users for a variety of streaming services. Rdio has less than one million paying subscribers, however, this does not include “freemium” users. These numbers can far surpass the amount of paying subscribers. Rdio’s data is not public but for a comparison, Spotify has over 6 million paying users (as of November 2013) and over 24 million total users. The “freemium” accounts are ad-supported and subsidize artist royalties. Rdio’s main competitors in the United States include Spotify, Pandora, Beats Music, Slacker, and Sirius XM  [6] [7] [8]

Shazam Partnership

In 2012, Shazam, a music recognition service, partnered with Rdio to allow users to listen to Shazam’d tracks via Rdio . However, this partnership was only available in select countries. In late 2013, Rdio and Shazam announced the expansion of this service to over 29 territories including Ecuador, Guatemala, Hungary, Austria, Sweden, and many more. It is important to note the significance of this expansion because the Rdio/Shazam service is now available in countries where competitors like Spotify are not (including  Canada, Chile, and Czech Republic.)  [9] [10]

Mobile Integration

Tesla_Model_S_digital_panels

Tesla Motor’s in-dash touchscreen display

As streaming services become increasingly popular, more services are emerging and fighting for domination in the market (think iTunes owns the digital download market). This creates more competition between the services and they are scrambling for ways to gain users. Streaming services have been partnering with cell phone providers to increase their customer base. Beats Music partnered with AT&T for a discounted family price and Spotify announced a partnership with Sprint. However, Rdio is going a different route. After being turned down by Spotify, American car company, Tesla, announced a partnership with Rdio in Europe . Gigaom reports “…consumers will be able to play any song from Rdio’s catalog of 20 million or so with a simple voice command,” the service will be integrated in the car’s dashboard system. Tesla CEO, Elon Musk says the service will be available very soon.  It is unknown whether or not Tesla will use Rdio as their default music service in the US market. Tesla currently has a partnership with Slacker Radio in the US territory. [11] [12]

Above is a photo of Tesla Motor’s in-dash touchscreen display. The Rdio client in the in-dash display will likely mirror the iPad application. This will ensure a positive and easy user experience.

Dhingana Acquisition

The Rdio lay-offs in late 2013 indicated that the company was struggling financially. However, it seems that the streaming service is doing better because they had sufficient funds (although we do not know the exact number) to purchase the Indian music streaming service: Dhingana.

Dhingana was founded in 2007 by brothers Snehal & Swapnil Schinde, and Sushil Choudhari. Dhingana primarily streams genres of Indian music boasting a catalog of over one million songs in 42 languages. Dhingana has other Indian competitors including Saavn and Gaana. Dhingana has approximately 10.5 million monthly users; the acquisition will add significant traction to Rdio’s numbers.

Smartphone sales growth

Smartphone sales growth.
Image courtesy of The Guardian.

Dhingana announced the acquisition on March 14, 2014 via their website and shut down the service. According to the press release, the Dhingana team will be working with Rdio to launch the service later this year. Rdio CEO, Anthony Bay, was quoted in Billboard Magazine, “India is a tremendously vibrant market for music and culture and one of the largest and most important in the world,” Bay’s strategy seems to be to expand their service in emerging markets, like India . Part of the Schinde brothers and Mr. Choudhari’s initiative at Rdio will be to expand into other emerging foreign markets.

This acquisition was a brilliant move on Rdio’s part. Recently The Guardian reported that India will pass the United States in smartphone sales this year, “India will be the country where the largest proportion of smartphones sold will go to new users,” this creates a larger market for potential streaming users.  The map above shows significant smartphone growth in Brazil, Indonesia, and China; it will be interesting to see what territories Rdio will expand to next. [5] [13]  [14]

Rdio Drops The Echo Nest

The Echo Nest is a music intelligence company that provides data to a variety of music industry entities. All of the competitors mentioned above (with the exception of Beats Music) use The Echo Nest to power music recommendation features on their platform. In March, Spotify announced that they acquired The Echo Nest. Following this, Rdio announced they will no longer use The Echo Nest’s service. Anthony Bay was quoted by The Verge saying: “As far as we are concerned, they were a good partner, but we have other good partners and we’ll move on… So we will stop using that source of data and use other sources.” . Rdio’s decision to unsubscribe to The Echo Nest can pan out to be either a unique, positive change to the service or, depending on the service they choose to work with, can damage the company’s reputation. [15]

Sources:

[1] Rdio | About Us RT: April 1, 2014

[2] Rdio | Apps RT: April 1, 2014

[3] Crunch Base | Executive information RT: April 1, 2014

[4] Tech Crunch | Rdio Layoffs RT: April 4, 2014

[5] Billboard | Rdio acquires Dhingana RT: April 4, 2014

[6] Digital Music News | Paid subscription numbers RT: April 4, 2014

[7] Investopedia | Definition of “Freemium” RT: April 15, 2014

[8] Spotify | Fast Facts RT: April 8, 2014

[9] Android Central | Rdio and Shazam Partnership RT: April 8, 2014

[10] Make Use Of | Rdio vs Spotify availability RT: April 8, 2014

[11] Giagaom | Rdio partners with Tesla Motors RT: April 3, 2014

[12] Techspot | Rdio Tesla Motors Partnership RT: April 3, 2014

[13] Dhingana | Acquisition press release RT: April 4, 2014

[14] The Guardian | Smartphone growth RT: April 4, 2014

[15] The Verge | Rdio drops The Echo Nest RT: April 15, 2014