Spotify: revenue up, losses widen

Spotify: revenue up, losses widen
By Euronews
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Spotify's revenues rise by 80 percent last year to 1.9 billion euros as it gained more subscribers, but losses were 184.5 million euros as it spent on product development and expansion.

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The music streaming service Spotify saw its revenues rise by 80 percent last year to 1.9 billion euros as it gained more subscribers.

However heavy spending on product development and international expansion led to a bigger operating loss for the privately-owned Swedish firm.

That loss was 184.5 million euros up from 165.1 million in 2014.

Subscriptions made up the bulk of revenues, while income from advertising nearly doubled to 195 million euros.

Global leader

Spotify is a global market leader in streaming and now boasts close to 100 million users in about 60 markets.

It has more than 30 million paying users – who get to hear music without having to also hear adverts – but faces tough competition from the likes of Apple Music, YouTube and Google Play Music.

The battle for users has intensified in recent months and Spotify has rolled out new content to attract new users. It now offers video, podcasts from the likes of TED Talks and NPR and a feature which matches music to the pace of a user’s run.

Apple Music, launched just a year ago in more than 100 countries, is chasing Spotify and already has 13 million paying subscribers.

Other competitors include Pandora Media, German start-up SoundCloud and US music producer and rapper Jay Z’s Tidal.

Concerning revenues from Spotify</a>, 80% revenue growth but $194 million loss in their "best year ever": <a href="https://t.co/EJvwhIblvB">https://t.co/EJvwhIblvB</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MusicBiz?src=hash">#MusicBiz</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/in?src=hash">#in</a></p>&mdash; Wendy Verwey Bekker (WendyVerwey) May 24, 2016

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