Music streaming service Spotify seems to be preparing for its India launch by the end of this month (January 31), the company has accidentally revealed on its terms and conditions page for the country.
The page has since been replaced with an older version of the company’s terms and conditions at the time of writing this article. (hat tip – Aroon Deep).
This development ties with a Variety report from earlier this week that had suggested a similar time frame for the India launch.
On Monday, the service had announced a global partnership with India’s leading music label T-Series to strengthen its music catalog with more than 160,000 tracks across various genres like Bollywood soundtracks, regional soundtracks, non-movie albums and songs from emerging artists among others.
Spotify CEO Daniel Ek had first announced plans to enter the India market in March last year, during the company’s investor day presentation, just prior to its direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange. The company had also roped in former OLX India CEO Amarjit Singh Batra as the India country head early last year.
India is expected to play a key role in Spotify’s international expansion plans, and according to media reports, had even become a bargaining chip during the licensing negotiations between the Swedish company and major record labels like Universal, Sony and Warner Music.
Ek, however, had downplayed these licensing problems during the company’s earnings conference call in November last year, saying that launch delays due to licensing is “commonplace in this industry and nothing related to our overall strategy”.
He also said that India is a fragmented marketplace, with a lot of different local labels and local publishers, due to which it is difficult to predict as to when they will enter the world’s second-largest Internet market.
ET had reported in November last year that Spotify was also in the final stages of negotiations with other Indian labels like Eros Music and Zee Music. Times Music* already has an international deal with Spotify and was in talks for an agreement for the India market.
Spotify, which recently surpassed 200 million global monthly active users, will compete with rivals like Gaana*, Amazon Prime Music, JioSaavn, Apple Music, Google Play Music, and Hungama in the country.
*Disclosure: Gaana was incubated by Times Internet that owns ETtech. Also, Times Music is a part of the Times Group.
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