August 26, 2011
By the ZippyCart Content Team
We’ve all been there. You hear a song on the radio or in a bar or restaraunt and you think: “What’s the name of this song? I want it!” Well, the people behind the mobile app SoundHound have come to the rescue of many music lovers. They offer an app that listens, analyzes and ultimately identifies the song you’re hearing and gives you the option to add the song to your iTunes shopping cart or watch the video on YouTube. Now, for those in Europe, Spotify has teamed up with SoundHound to offer instant streaming of search results.
Music search and discovery company SoundHound has signed a deal with digital music service provider Spotify to allow SoundHound users in Europe to instantly access Spotify’s catalogue (over 15 million tracks). At this point in time, users in the States will not have access to this new feature. Those who followed Spotify will recall that the company’s service was exclusive to European users until earlier this summer, when Spotify released a US version of its music streaming service.
Starting today, European SoundHound users on iOS and Android devices who have also added a Spotify Premium subscription to their shopping cart will be given the option to ‘Play Now in Spotify’ after identifying a song through the music discovery and recognition service. While all SoundHound users will have access to the streaming option, only Spotify Premium members will be able to actually listen to the songs. Those who are not Premium members will be redirected to a purchase page where they can add a subscription to their shopping cart.
“Spotify is a natural fit with Soundhound, the most groundbreaking mobile music search and discovery platform in the world,” said Katie McMahon, VP of Soundhound. “Our European users have been requesting seamless access to Spotify, and today they can enjoy Soundhound’s fast, beautiful and unlimited music search and discovery with instant access to listening to full tracks.”
The two companies did not immediately reveal financial details of the partnership. The two services compliment each other so well that it’s actually not surprising a deal was made. There’s still room for expansion, however. The two companies could open up the Spotify feature to free users, instead of limiting it to premium users only. Of course, allowing the newly formed American user base to access the new feature would also be beneficial for both companies in terms of exposure and market share.
The online music industry is becoming increasingly competitive, as new companies arise to take on the big dogs in the industry. Pandora, the mobile and Desktop Internet radio company, recently went public with a mixed reception on Wall Street. Today, the company that struggled to become profitable has unveiled its largest gains ever. Apple is set to launch the iCloud this fall, which will allow iOS and Mac OSX users to stream their music libraries to mobile devices. The idea of remotely accessing a music library from anywhere in the world is not exclusive to Apple. Google and Amazon also recently unveiled their cloud music offerings.
It will be interesting to see how long it takes Spotify to allow its American users to access the new features. Extremely popular in Europe, Spotify took years to land in the US as the company negotiated licensing deals with record companies. Spotify currently boasts more than 1.4 million users and 175,000 users have added a Premium subscription to their shopping cart.
Taylor is originally from Washington, DC, but has lived in the Seattle area for the past 5 years. He’s a senior at the University of Washington, studying Political Science (with no interest in entering the political world). He’s more interested in the Tech industry, especially consumer electronics, cloud computing, and how mobile internet and devices will change the business world. He spends most of his free time tinkering with his Subaru and surfing whenever possible.
