Popular European music streaming website is set to finally launch in the US. Rumours about the launch have been circulating for months, but it appears that the owners have finally raised enough capital to do a deal with the major record labels to give it a critical mass of content to launch in the biggest music market in the world.
The site has launched a holding page for its US service, with music fans asked to enter an email address to receive updates. Although no further specifics are available, it indicates that a recent round of private equity funding is thought to have raised a war chest of $1 Billion dollars to pay major record labels to make their back catalogues available to punters in the US. A press event is set to be held today, Australian time, which will announce the launch and could include information on a heavily rumoured partnership with Facebook to provide music streaming services.
Spotify wants to challenge iTunes for the crown of the world’s leading provider of digital music, but in spite of the massive level of investment in it, it’s still bleeding like a stuck pig. Spotify has struggled to find the massive financial wherewithal to launch in the US – despite being popular in Europe pundits have always predicted that US music fans would want to ‘own’ rather than stream their music on demand.
However it appears that after successful testing of the service in the US market, fans are convinced and it is about to get the massive funding and launch green light from management and investors.
