Spotify, Europe’s beloved freemium streaming music service, is looking at a US launch window of 30 to 60 days.
The news comes from its CEO Daniel Ek at a music conference in Los Angeles. "We’re in the final stages of setting up. Yesterday we signed a data center contract, which is huge for us. We’re making a huge investment in servers and all the infrastructure here in the US," Ek told Billboard.
Ek also said the service is still adding "a few thousand" paying subscribers in Europe every day; the service is free, but users can pay for ad-free premium accounts.
Ek said during a presentation that Spotify will have a US download partner; aim for ticket and merchandise sales partnerships; likely keep mobile apps part of premium subscriptions; and offer a free version to the US.
In a couple of separate notes, the company has also revamped its artist discovery feature to include Spotify’s own "cross-referencing data collected [from] millions of users’ listening hours." Previously, Spotify used a recommendation engine from AllMusic.
Before the US Launch, it appears that France will be getting access to Spotify’s service. Spotify is lifting its invite-only restriction in France, and the music streaming service will now let anyone register. Users have to verify their phone numbers, likely to make sure that they are indeed living in France. The change comes now because Spotify says it can "maintain the quality of service for many users." |
