RUMOR: Apple and Spotify in ‘on-again, off-again’ acquisition discussions

16 years ago

“Here’s what we heard – Apple and Spotify are in on-again, off-again discussions about an acquisition, but at best it’s very early in the process. No firm price has been offered, no term sheet tabled,” Michael Arrington reports for TechCrunch. “Still, it’s interesting that the two are talking.”

“But way more interesting is this – Last year, around the time that Apple acquired music service Lala, Google and Spotify were deep in acquisition discussions, says a source with knowledge of the negotiations,” Arrington reports. “Ultimately no deal happened, and the two companies tried to negotiate a deal to have Spotify pre-installed on all Android phones instead.”

Arrington reports, “But the deal almost happened, says our source, and Google was going to pay nearly $1 billion for the service. Ultimately the deal went sideways because Google was demanding that all label deals be grandfathered in. And Spotify wanted a $800 million+ walk away fee if the deal faltered.”