Spotify is launching an audiobook platform.
The streaming giant - which is currently the most used app in the world for listening to music and podcasts - is branching out to include audiobooks as part of its mammoth catalogue and expects to "win" the market once again when it goes into competition with the likes of Audible and Kobo.
Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said: "We believe that audiobooks, in their many different forms, will be a massive opportunity. And just as we’ve done in podcasting, expect us to play to win."
Spotify is currently home to around eight million creators and boasts over 180 million premium subscribers worldwide and the CEO went on to claim that while the move into audibook builds on their ambition to be the ulimtate "destination" for artists, they have no plans to stop there.
In a blog post, he explained: "And this third vertical of audiobooks further builds on our ambitions to be the destination for creators. While it’s still early, we expect audiobooks to also have healthy margins, above 40% and be highly accretive to the business. And here again, we will apply the same differentiating foundations of ubiquity, personalization, and Freemium to attract both creators and users, and drive engagement.
"But importantly, we aren’t planning to stop there. We see the opportunity to continue to imagine and explore new verticals across our platform—within audio, but also beyond. And for each vertical, we will develop a unique set of software, services, and products and business models that’s going to be tailored for that specific ecosystem. But again, all of these will live in one consumer experience."
