Spotify Hits 30m Subs

Spotify CEO Daniel Ek has revealed that the streaming service now has 30 million subscribers. In a tweet this week, which also apparently referenced an imminent launch in Cuba, Ek said: We have 30 million ‪@Spotify‬‬‬‬ subscribers, but none of them are in Cuba … yet”.

Ek was presumably referring to paying subscribers, as Spotify’s global reach was reported in June last year as over 75m, 20m of which were paying. This in turn means an increase of 10m paying subscribers since last summer, adding weight to Ek’s argument that the launch of Apple Music actually assisted with growing Spotify’s user base.

Of course, Ek is experiencing his own bay of pigs as major artists continue to desert the service or ‘window’ major releases – As highlighted here by Music Business Worldwide, Gwen Stefani is the latest in line to choose another day one service over Spotify, following albums from The 1975 and Coldplay. Not to mention the numerous high profile artists who have pulled catalogue entirely from Spotify, including Prince, Neil Young and Taylor Swift. This is likely to be an ongoing headache for Spotify and an indication that the future of streaming may well resemble a fragmented battleground, with Tidal forced to continually expand its free trial month as Kanye West perpetually tweaks album exclusive ‘The Life of Pablo’.

In related news, Apple can now claim to have achieved slightly more subscriptions than Spotify in the same time period – 11m in nine months, in comparison to Spotify’s 10m, of course taking into account all of those free subscribers attracted in the initial three-month trial period.

In streaming news from across the pond, the Recorded Industry Association of America (RIAA) has announced that the US recorded music market was up 0.9% to $7.0bn at estimated retail value in 2015 – with streaming now accounting for one third of revenues.

The Gen is already working hard on a Castro themed playlist for a future edition.