Spotify Is Going Public Without An IPO: Will Other Tech Unicorns Follow?

Launched in 2008 by entrepreneurs Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon, Stockholm, Sweden-based Spotify is one of the most popular streaming services on the market today. With its desktop and mobile app version, the company allows users to search or browse, for free, through its extensive music library. Spotify also offers a “Premium” subscription for $9.99 per month that removes advertisements and lets users download music to listen to offline.

Competition

Spotify recently announced that it now has 140 million monthly active users, with 60 million paying for the service. This achievement has cemented its status as the biggest subscription music service by user count, and the leader in the increasingly crowded music streaming industry.

Arguably Spotify’s biggest market rival is Apple’s (AAPL – Free Report) Apple Music. Launched in 2015, Apple Music is a streaming music service based on Beats Music, which has drawn listeners with playlists made by experts, not algorithms. The service is also known for its collaborations with high-profile musicians like Drake and Taylor Swift. It costs $9.99 per month, and users can download music from an extensive digital library, just like Spotify. Apple Music offers listeners a free, three-month initial trial.

There’s also Tidal, the Scandinavian streaming service that rapper and mogul Jay-Z scooped up back in 2015 for $56 million. It has a similar price of $9.99 per month for normal streaming, while also offering a $19.99 per month option that includes high-fidelity sound quality. Like Apple Music, Tidal is known for its partnerships with big music names. Rihanna, Beyoncé, and Kanye West all exclusively debuted their latest albums on Tidal before a wider release.

Other top rivals include Rdio, which provides access to online radio stations, with different levels of on-demand access, for $3.99 to $9.99 per month; Pandora (P –Free Report) , one of the original internet radio companies, recently debuted Pandora Premium, a $9.99 per month streaming music service; Rhapsody, the original streaming music subscription service, has been around since 2001, and is available for $9.99 per month; and Alphabet’s (GOOGL – Free Report) Google Play Music, which offers online music storage and a streaming service for $9.99 per month.