With streaming becoming the #1 way to consume music, everyone is trying to get a piece of the pie. From Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine selling their Beats music brand to Apple for a stunning 3 billion to Last year, Neil Young raised more than $6 million for his startup Pono, which makes a portable music player that emits vinyl-record quality sound. Now we can add jay Z to the mix of things.
Jay Z has had a more storied career out of the rap game as of late with his vast number of successful business ventures. Today the mogul offered $56 million to snatch the Swedish music streaming company Aspiro. Both companies announced the offer on Friday.
According to yahoo, Aspiro owns the music subscription service WiMP, which streams “HiFi-quality audio,” along with magazines and video content too. It has partnerships with major record companies including those at Sony, Universal and Warner — giving it access to huge libraries of music.
In the United States, the service is known as Tidal.
Jay-Z, whose real name is Shawn Corey Carter, made the deal through one of his many business ventures, Project Panther Bidco.
In a statement, Project Panther said it plans to expand Aspiro’s platform worldwide.
“The recent developments in the entertainment industry, with the migration to media streaming, offers great potential for increased entertainment consumption and an opportunity for artists to further promote their music,” it said.
Jay-Z representatives noted the deal hasn’t closed yet.
But Streaming Media AS, the company that owns 76% of Aspiro, said it will accept the offer. It was a sweet deal. At $56 million, Aspiro is valued at one-and-a-half times what it currently trades at on the Stockholm Stock Exchange.