Spotify has broken a major milestone, with the streaming music service claiming it has now got more than 100 million active monthly subscribers. The Swedish streaming company advised earlier today that approximately 30 percent of its user base pay a monthly subscription fee, and the number of users of the service continues to grow at a rate of 1.8 million users per month, though at a cost to its bottom line.
Despite the high member count
advised to
The Telegraph, Spotify still continues to suffer financially. While it recently replaced Skype as the most highly valued European startup worth roughly $8.5 billion, according to one investment bank, it's most recent financial report advises its revenues rose 80 percent to €1.95 billion ($2.2 billion) for all of last year, but its losses increased ten percent to €173 million ($195 million).
The increase in losses is one of a few problems Spotify is starting to run into, as part of an extremely competitive marketplace.
Reuters reports Apple Music as having 13 million paid users roughly a year after launch, indicating it to be growing at a far faster rate than Spotify, which launched in late 2008, and could beat it within the next two years if it stays at its current growth rate.
To fend off the threat of Apple Music and other similar services, Spotify raised
$1 billion from investors in March, with the convertible debt giving it more flexibility before an expected IPO.
It also has to deal with record labels and singers complaining about low royalty rates typically caused through an ad-supported "free" service. A
recently-rumored plan involves restricting the availability of new albums to subscribers, to try and coax free users over to the paid service, and it apparently came close to implementing it for a Radiohead album launch, though technical issues reportedly prevented it from taking place.
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