Spotify on subscription growth, world music and the next big opportunities in streaming

Music streaming giant Spotify is stepping into a new stage of growth - one that focuses on more artist diversity and non-music content.

Transcript

00:002023 was a record year in subscription growth from Spotify.

00:03So we added more subscribers on our platform than in any year previously.

00:08So even in difficult climates, it's one of those services that people keep

00:12because music has so many roles to play in a consumer's daily life,

00:16whether it's sort of on your own in the morning, going to work, doing workout, doing chores.

00:21Music is something that people want to have there.

00:23And hence, it's probably one of those services in your household portfolio of spendings

00:28that you keep irrespective of the situation.

00:31Developing the music industry globally is a passion project for us at Spotify.

00:35If you look back at what the music industry used to be maybe 15, 20, 25 years ago,

00:40it was very dominated by Anglo-American music.

00:43Today, we see two big trends on our platform.

00:46It's really the advances of local music.

00:50So music in the local language that tends to be

00:52what's really resonated with listeners around the world.

00:55But the other massive trend we're seeing is how genres and music

00:59cross-border very, very rapidly point-to-point.

01:02So we've seen the growth of Latin music and the phenomenon with that.

01:05We've seen the growth of music from Asia, such as K-pop.

01:09And most recently, we're really encouraged to see the growth of the African music

01:13going global with Afrobeats and highlife and other genres from West Africa.

01:17And also, you're branching out more and more into other forms of content, audiobooks.

01:23Talk more about that and how that fits into Spotify's longer-term strategy.

01:28We obviously started as a music service back in 2008.

01:32But then we saw spoken word catching on organically on platform.

01:36And it was uploaded by creators.

01:38And consumers started consuming it.

01:40And they wanted the convenience of one app that could provide all their audio needs.

01:45And that's when we started leaning into podcasts

01:47and really found a way to deliver that medium through the same app as the music content.

01:52And then we thought to ourselves, if podcast, why not audiobooks and other things?

01:57Because audiobooks is one of those parts of the publishing and the books industry

02:01that is really growing phenomenally.

02:03So we're pleased to both have launched a la carte audiobooks purchases

02:08with hundreds of thousands of titles around the world,

02:10but also putting audiobooks into our premium service

02:14in a number of markets around the world, such as UK and Ireland,

02:17which is really resonating well with consumers.

02:20And as I said, it's part of delivering sort of a better value to price ratio for consumer

02:26so that they get more from this Spotify subscription.