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Apple recently confirmed their acquisition of the popular music identification, discovery and monitoring platform, Shazam. After a reportedly competitive bidding war with Snap and Spotify, Apple made an integral step toward becoming a leader in the music-industry and becoming the central hub for the consumers’ everyday life.
Billboard reporter Cherie Hu analyzed the acquisition in her article: “Apple Gains Power with Shazam, But It’s Still ‘No Silver Bullet’ For Music Discovery: Analysis.”
In the article, Hu shared her perspective on Shazam’s recent successes and failures, the future of music streaming and content creation, as well as Shazam’s potential integration into Apple’s product-line.
The Marketing Arm’s Chief Innovation Officer and President of Music Larry Weintraub shared his commentary on the new acquisition:
“To the extent that all the major streaming services have the same offering — $10 a month for tens of millions of tracks – they have to start asking themselves what their true differentiation of ‘why-us’ proposition is to the consumer.”
The article also weighs in on the benefits Apple will gain through this new ownership. To compete with other music streaming services, such as Spotify, Apple Music could monitor Shazam activity for certain songs and artists to then add to the streaming service.
Weintraub continued with his thoughts on the potential for original content creation:
“If you’re Apple, your priority is not just in the device and hardware business, but also increasingly in the original content business. And if you’re creating and distributing video content with music in it, and you want people to subscribe to your music service to listen to those songs after the fact, Shazam is a key part of that ecosystem.”
This acquisition will allow Apple to utilize the data obtained from Shazam to help them profit not only for their music streaming services, but also for smart home technology, Apple TV, and more.
While many view this acquisition as a key step for Apple to become a leader in the music-industry, there are still several steps and possible acquisitions that need to be made for Apple to control the future of music streaming and discovery.
Read the full story here.
