Spotify is about to get some serious competition after Jay Z spent $56 million on competitor, Tidal. Not many have heard about Tidal, but we can say for certain that the music platform is decent enough, and with the backing of a huge American rapper, it could become the next big thing.
We should point out that it isn't Jay Z, who is acquiring Tidal, but a company called Project Panther that is in some ways indirectly owned by Carter Enterprises, a Jay Z owned company. Tidal itself is owned by another company called Aspiro, which also owns a service called WiMP.
WiMP is a service with around 500,000 subscribers before the launch of Tidal. Now, that is nothing compared to Spotify and the likes of Beats Music, but the service is climbing the ladder. If everything goes according to plan, the name Tidal could be on everyone's lips in the next 2 years.
Due to the successes of Dr. Dre in the music industry with Beats Music and headphones, it makes perfect sense that Jay Z would be interested in entering the market in hopes to swim in some of that money. No doubt, he'll use his influence to push Tidal to the masses, but that alone won't be enough.
Tidal at the moment cannot compete with Spotify on the amount of songs available in its catalog. However, as its popularity grows, we expect this will not be a problem, but the service should not expect to make a deal with the likes of Taylor Swift any time soon.
Furthermore, for those who are unaware, Tidal is based in Scandinavia, and is considered as a high-quality music service. Due to the lossless music playback, everything will sound better than whatever Spotify can deliver. It's more expensive, but that shouldn't matter due to the music sound quality.
The cost to stream music via Tidal right now, is $20 per month. That's a lot, but completely worth it. Still, we expect a cheaper option with lesser quality to better compete with the big guys because not everyone is willing to throw away $20 per month.
