After acquiring cloud-based music and podcast creation tool Soundtrap five years ago, Spotify is focusing on other areas.
Launched in Spotify’s home country of Sweden in 2013, Soundtrap is a web-based recording, editing and mixing tool that enables easy-to-use real-time collaboration. The application was acquired by Spotify in 2017 for an estimated $30 million. Over the next few years, Soundtrap saw huge growth, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, adding new features along the way, including mobile his sound his recorder his app. Spotify then implemented the software into his Roblox partnership and Metaverse experiments. Soundtrap was believed to be used by over 10 million people since its launch in January 2021.
Now, Spotify plans to sell Soundtrap back to founders Per Emanuelsson and Björn Melinder for an undisclosed sum and to operate as an independent business again. As highlighted at this year’s Stream On event, music production no longer seems to be a priority as Spotify focuses on marketing opportunities for artists.
Soundtrap was built to provide the best collaboration platform for making music online. Together with Soundtrap co-founder Björn Melinder, we have decided to acquire the company from Spotify and return it to independent operations. Over the past five years, we have greatly benefited from Spotify’s expertise and global reach, allowing us to rapidly expand our service and launch new products. We thank Spotify for getting us where we are today and are very excited about the future.
Soundtrap CEO and Co-founder Per Emanuelsson
Soundtrap continues to make great strides in enabling more people to create music collaboratively online. We are proud of what we have achieved together so far and look forward to seeing the next stage of growth for Soundtrap over the next few years.
Charlie Hellman, Vice President Global Head of Music Products at Spotify
The move is nothing new for music streaming services. Spotify sold another startup it acquired just two years later back to its founders. Artist service directory SoundBetter sold his October 2021.
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