Spotify Technology S.A. (/ˈspɒtɪfaɪ/) is an international media services provider.

It is legally
domiciled in Luxembourg and is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden.[6]
Founded in 2006, the company's primary business is providing an audio streaming platform, the
"Spotify" platform, that provides DRM-restricted music, videos and podcasts from record labels
and media companies. As a freemium service, basic features are free with advertisements or
automatic music videos, while additional features, such as offline listening and commercial-free
listening, are offered via paid subscriptions.
Launched on 7 October 2008, the Spotify platform provides access to over 50 million tracks.
[7]
 Users can browse by parameters such as artist, album, or genre, and can create, edit, and
share playlists. Spotify is available in most of Europe and the Americas, Australia, New Zealand,
and parts of Africa and Asia, and on most modern devices, including Windows, macOS,
and Linux computers, and iOS, and Android smartphones and tablets.[8][9] As of February 2020,
the company had 271 million monthly active users, including 124 million paying subscribers.[10]
Unlike physical or download sales, which pay artists a fixed price per song or album sold, Spotify
pays royalties based on the number of artist streams as a proportion of total songs streamed. It
distributes approximately 70% of its total revenue[11] to rights holders, who then pay artists based
on their individual agreements. Spotify has faced criticism from artists and producers
including Taylor Swift and Thom Yorke, who have argued that it does not fairly compensate
musicians. In 2017, as part of its efforts to renegotiate license deals for an interest in going
public, Spotify announced that artists would be able to make albums temporarily exclusive to
paid subscribers if the albums are part of Universal Music Group or the Merlin Network.
Spotify's international headquarters are in Stockholm, Sweden, though each region has its own
headquarters. Since February 2018, it has been listed on the New York Stock Exchange and in
September 2018, the company relocated its New York City offices to 4 World Trade Center.[12]

Contents

 1History
o 1.1Launch in 2008
o 1.2Early international launches
o 1.3Other developments
 1.3.1Streaming records
 1.3.2User growth
 1.3.3Initial public offering
 1.3.4Acquisitions
 1.3.5Company partnerships
 1.3.6Dispute with Apple
 1.3.7Organizational development strategy
 2Business model
o 2.1Accounts and subscriptions
o 2.2Monetization
 2.2.1Funding
o 2.3Advertisements
o 2.4Downloads
o 2.5Spotify for Artists
o 2.6Industry initiatives
o 2.7Stations by Spotify
 3Platforms
o 3.1Features
 3.1.1Playlists and discovery
o 3.2Listening limitations
 o 3.3Technical information
 4Geographic availability
 5Accolades
 6Criticism
 7Literature
 8See also
 9References
 10External links

History[edit]

Daniel Ek addressing Spotify staff in 2010

Spotify was developed in 2006[13] by a team in Stockholm, Sweden. The company was founded
by Daniel Ek, former CTO of Stardoll, and Martin Lorentzon, co-founder of TradeDoubler. The
company's title, according to Daniel Ek, was initially misheard from a name shouted by Martin
Lorentzon. Later they thought out an etymology of a combination of "spot" and "identify".
[14]
 Spotify operates internationally under a multitude of companies in different regions. Spotify
currently has 44 offices that operate internationally.[15]

Launch in 2008[edit]

Spotify's original logo (2008–2012)

The Spotify application was launched on 7 October 2008. While free accounts remained
available by invitation to manage the growth of the service, the launch opened paid subscriptions
to everyone. At the same time, Spotify AB announced licensing deals with major music labels.[16]

Early international launches[edit]

Former Spotify headquarters in Stockholm

In February 2009, Spotify opened public registration for the free service tier in the United
Kingdom.[17] Registrations surged following the release of the mobile service, leading Spotify to
halt registration for the free service in September, returning the UK to an invitation-only policy.
[18]
 Premium cards were offered for the 2009 Christmas season that allowed recipients to upgrade
an account to "Premium" status for 1, 3, 6, or 12 months.[19]
For the service's launch in the United States in July 2011, Spotify had a six-month free ad-
supported trial period, where new users could listen to an unlimited amount of music. In January
2012, the free trial started expiring, with users limited to ten hours each month and five song
replays.[20] In March, Spotify removed all limits on the free service tier indefinitely.[21]
In April 2016, Ek and Lorentzon wrote an open letter to Swedish politicians demanding action in
three areas that they claimed hindered the company's ability to recruit top talent as Spotify
grows, including access to flexible housing, better education in the programming and
development fields, and stock options. Ek and Lorentzon wrote that in order to continue
competing in a global economy, politicians needed to respond with new policies, or else
thousands of Spotify jobs would be moved from Sweden to the United States.[22]
Towards the end of 2016, the company launched its "largest [marketing] campaign to date", by
placing large-scale billboards in major cities around the world that humorously mocked users'
listening habits. Billboards featured commentary such as "Dear person who made a playlist
called: ‘One Night Stand With Jeb Bush Like He’s a Bond Girl in a European Casino.’ We have
so many questions"; "To the 1,235 guys who loved the “Girls Night” playlist this year, We love
you", and "Dear person who played ‘Sorry’ 42 times on Valentine's Day, What did you do?”
Spotify's Chief Marketing Officer Seth Farbman told Creativity that "there has been some debate
about whether big data is muting creativity in marketing, but we have turned that on its head ...
For us, data inspires and gives an insight into the emotion that people are expressing."[23][24]
In February 2017, Spotify announced a major expansion of its United States operations in Lower
Manhattan, New York City, at 4 World Trade Center, into one of its largest operations, adding
approximately 1,000 new jobs and retaining 832 existing positions.[25] The company's US
headquarters are located in New York City's Flatiron District.[26]
On 14 November 2018, the company announced a total of 13 new markets in the MENA region,
including the creation of a new Arabic hub and several playlists, while supporting right-to-left text
in their apps.[27]

Other developments[edit]
Streaming records[edit]
Main article: List of most-streamed artists on Spotify
In October 2015, "Thinking Out Loud" by Ed Sheeran became the first song to pass 500 million
streams.[28] A month later, Spotify announced that "Lean On" by Major Lazer and DJ
Snake featuring MØ was its most streamed song of all time with over 525 million streams
worldwide.[29] In April 2016, Rihanna overtook Justin Bieber to become the biggest artist on
Spotify, with 31.3 million monthly active listeners.[30] In May 2016, Rihanna was overtaken
by Drake with 3.185 billion total streams.[31] In December 2016, Drake's just-under 36 million
monthly listeners were overtaken by the Weeknd's 36.068 million.[32] Later that month, Drake's
song "One Dance" became the first song to hit one billion streams on Spotify.[33][34] Upon its
release in August 2017, the single "Look What You Made Me Do" by Taylor Swift earned over
eight million streams within 24 hours, breaking the record for the most single-day streams for a
track.[35] On 19 June 2018, XXXTentacion's hit single "Sad!" broke Swift's single-day streaming
record, amassing 10.4 million streams the day after he was fatally shot in Florida.[36]
User growth[edit]
In March 2011, Spotify announced a customer base of one million paying subscribers across
Europe,[37] and by September 2011, the number of paying subscribers had doubled to two million.
[38]
 In August 2012, Time reported 15 million active users, four million being paying Spotify
subscribers.[39] User growth continued, reaching 20 million total active users, including five million
paying customers globally and one million paying customers in the United States, in December
2012.[40] By March 2013, the service had 24 million active users, six million being paying
subscribers,[41] which grew to 40 million users (including ten million paying) in May 2014,[42] 60
million users (including 15 million paying) in December 2014,[43] 75 million users (20 million
paying) in June 2015,[44] 30 million paying subscribers in March 2016,[45] 40 million paying
subscribers in September 2016,[46] and 100 million total users in June 2016.[47]
Initial public offering[edit]
According to TechCrunch, Spotify was planning to become public on the stock market in 2017,
but instead used an Initial Public Offering (IPO) in 2018 in order to "build up a better balance
sheet and work on shifting its business model to improve its margins".[48] The value of its IPO is
estimated to be in a range of $6.3 billion to $23 billion.[49] The latter figure would make Spotify's
IPO one of the biggest in the tech sector since 2012.[49] However, unlike in an ordinary public
offering, Spotify would not issue new shares, but the company's existing shareholders would be
taking their shares directly to the market. This approach is not intended to raise fresh capital, but
to let investors get their returns.[49][50][51] Morgan Stanley is the company's slated advisor on the
matter.[51]
Financial Times reported in March 2017 that, as part of its efforts to renegotiate new licensing
deals with music labels, Spotify and major record labels had agreed that Spotify would restrict
some newly-released albums to its Premium tier, with Spotify receiving a reduction in royalty fees
to do so. Select albums would be available only on the Premium tier for a period of time, before
general release. The deal "may be months away from being finalized, but Spotify is said to have
cleared this particular clause with major record labels".[52][53][54] New reports in April confirmed that
Spotify and Universal Music Group had reached an agreement to allow artists part of Universal to
limit their new album releases to the Premium service tier for a maximum of two weeks. Spotify
CEO Daniel Ek commented that "We know that not every album by every artist should be
released the same way, and we’ve worked hard with UMG to develop a new, flexible release
policy. Starting today, Universal artists can choose to release new albums on premium only for
two weeks, offering subscribers an earlier chance to explore the complete creative work, while
the singles are available across Spotify for all our listeners to enjoy".[55][56][57] It was announced later
in April that this type of agreement would be extended to indie artists signed to the Merlin
Network agency.[58][59]
After going live on the New York Stock Exchange on 3 April 2018, CNBC reported that Spotify
opened at $165.90, more than 25 percent above its reference price of $132.[60]
Acquisitions[edit]
In March 2014, Spotify announced that it had acquired The Echo Nest, a music intelligence
company that has "in depth musical understanding and tools for curation to drive music discovery
for millions of users around the globe".[61][62]
In June 2015, Spotify acquired Seed Scientific, a data science consulting firm and analytics
company. In a comment to TechCrunch, Spotify said that Seed Scientific's team would lead an
Advanced Analytics unit within the company focused on developing data services.[63][64] In April
2016, Spotify acquired CrowdAlbum, a "startup that collects photos and videos of performances
shared on social networks", and would "enhance the development of products that help artists
understand, activate, and monetize their audiences".[65][66]
In March 2017, Spotify acquired Sonalytic,[67] an audio detection startup, for an undisclosed
amount of money. Spotify stated that Sonalytic would be used to improve the company's
personalised playlists, better match songs with compositions, and improve the company's
publishing data system.[68] Spotify also acquired MightyTV later in March, an app connected to
television streaming services, including Netflix and HBO Go, that recommends content to users.
Spotify mainly uses MightyTV to improve its advertising efforts on the free tier of service.[69]
In April 2017, Spotify acquired Mediachain, a blockchain startup that had been developing a
decentralized database system for managing attribution and other metadata for media.[70][71] In
May 2017, Spotify acquired artificial intelligence startup Niland, and uses its technology to
improve its personalisation and recommendation features for users.[72][73] In November 2017,
Spotify acquired SoundTrap, an online music studio startup.[74][75] On 12 April 2018, Spotify
acquired the music licensing platform Loudr.[76] On 6 February 2019, Spotify acquired the podcast
networks Gimlet Media and Anchor FM Inc., establishing itself as a major player in podcasting.
[77]
 On 26 March 2019, Spotify announced it would acquire another podcast network, Parcast.[78]
On 12 September 2019, Spotify acquired SoundBetter, a music production marketplace for
people in the music industry to collaborate on projects, and distribute music tracks for licensing.[79]
On 5 February 2020, Spotify announced its intent to acquire Bill Simmons' sports blog and
podcast network The Ringer for an undisclosed amount.[80][81]