You have missed it if you blinked, but Spotify went public just a few weeks ago and, in turn, the streaming service on Wednesday released its earnings report for the March quarter. When the dust settled, Spotify posted revenue of $1.36 billion, a solid increase of about 26% year-over-year. Still, that number came in slightly below Wall Street expectations. Revenue aside, the company posted a loss of about $49 million for the quarter.
In the wake of the company’s earnings report, Spotify shares plummeted nearly 10% in after hours trading. The good news, though, is that Spotify’s subscriber base continues to impress, even as the Swedish-based company faces increased competition from Apple.
According to Spotify, the company at the end of March had 170 million active users. Of that subset, 75 million are paying subscribers, a figure which represents a 45% increase year-over-year. The last time Spotify disclosed subscription figures, it disclosed that its active user base totaled 159 million users of which 71 million were paying subscribers. Interestingly, it appears that the cumulative number of paid subscribers on Spotify is growing faster than the cumulative number of active users.
As to Spotify’s chief competition, Apple Music currently boasts more than 40 million paying subscribers. While Spotify still enjoys a sizable lead over Apple, some believe that Apple Music may soon surpass Spotify as Apple’s own streaming service appears to be growing at a faster clip.
Spotify CEO Daniel Ek, however, doesn’t appear to be the least bit threatened.
“We don’t see any kind of meaningful impact of competition,” Ek said during an earnings conference call. “In fact, when we look at this, we don’t really think that this is a winner-takes-all market. In fact, we think multiple services will exist in the markets and we’re all kind of in a growing market, and we’re just focused on growing that market and capturing more market.”
Regardless, Spotify remains confident about the future. As of a few weeks ago, the company said that it may have upwards of 208 million active users and as many as 96 million paid subscribers by the end of 2018.
