Spotify Invades US Shores, Confirmed
After plenty of rumors, conjectures and tittle-tattles these past few months, Spotify finally confirmed on their website a stateside launch. And if you think you have a chance at getting an early account once the official launch is released, you can leave your email address on the site.
“Millions of tracks ready to play instantly, on your computer and your phone. Any track, any time, anywhere. And its free,” reads the statement on the Spotify web site.
Whether the service is accessible via application or browser is still unclear. For now, the company managed to lock deals with the 4 major music labels: Universal Music, Sony Music, EMI Music, and the most difficult as usual, Warner Music. As for subscription rate, rumors said it will be around $10 a month, aligning with other existing music services such as Rhapsody and MOG.
Spotify’s expansion to the US means tight competition with Pandora, Apple, Rdio, Google, and Amazon — but rest assured, Spotify is not falling behind the game that turned mere users into aficionados in its European territory.
According to Noisecast, Facebook will partner with Spotify to launch a music service to sit snugly beside the social network’s Photos, Friends and Places. The said “music dashboard” is said to integrate friends’ recommendations as well. While Facebook has already rolled out the much-rumored Skype video chat integration but there’s no sign of Spotify music deal everywhere. I don’t think the deal is unlikely to materialize, but perhaps Facebook doesn’t think now’s the time for the launch. There’s a much seasoned period for its unveiling.
Spotify currently has 10 million registered users– 1 million of which from Europe. Hopefully, the US expansion will dramatically improve the figure. According to All Things D, Spotify has been working on closing record deals and raising funds over the past 6 months. It has so far accumulated $100 million from DST, Kleiner Perkins and Accel.
In order to outperform competitors such Apple, Google and Pandora, Spotfiy’s got to do doll up good enough for users to switch. Pandora has always have a steady flow of updates that’ll be tough to beat.
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