Bittersweet Symphony

The music industry’s bottom line had been getting squelched by a series of internet models (including the one that let us steal music for a few years) until Spotify came along like a jukebox hero to rescue the music business from the hard knock life and give it hope of being back in black. There’s no question that Spotify’s model has revolutionized music. The question is whether or not that will ultimately be enough for Spotify to survive. Mega tech companies like Apple and Amazon are now in the same business, and they have advantages such as massive device-owning userbases and the ability to operate their music channels as loss leaders. It’s the same old song being heard across the consumer tech market as big tech companies use their platforms as petri dishes to decide what features to launch next. Spotify v the giants is a classic David and Goliath story, except in this case, David has a valuation of about $20 billion. And if that’s not enough for Spotify, what does that mean for the rest of the consumer startup space? Fortune: Spotify Saved the Music Industry. Now What?

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