Will Spotify Ever Launch in the U.S.?

Posted 12/08/2010 at 8:25am | by Paul Lilly

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We've been hearing for months that Spotify, a European music service that offers both a free streaming service and a paid subscription model, would launch in the U.S. by the end of the year, but guess what? The end of the year is only three-and-a-half weeks away and Spotify doesn't even have a passport.

According to CNet, Spotify hasn't even managed to sign a single licensing deal with a major label. Not a good sign, given that they've had over a year to negotiate. Nor is it promising that Spotify CEO Daniel Ek is now saying he can't commit to a U.S. launch date.

It's all just a numbers game, and at last count, Ek said Spotify has a paying subscription base 750,000 members strong, each one shelling out $13/month for the service. However, that only represents 7.5 percent of Spotify's 10 million users, a percentage which doesn't really excite music labels.

That's too bad, because as Napster co-founder and Spotify investor Sean Parker notes, Spotify's U.S. launch could be a "very disruptive event" to how users consume music.