Tim Westergren Talks Internet Radio At Web 2.0 Summit

Tim Westergren

PANDORA Co-founder TIM WESTERGREN spoke YESTERDAY (10/18) at THE WEB 2.0 SUMMIT, and discussed the present and future of the webcasting giant.

WESTERGREN noted the company has over 900,000 songs in its library, 95% of which were played on PANDORA during JULY. FORBES notes other highlights from his speech, including:

* The company has now been around for 11 years -- once a start-up, but no longer.

* iPHONE launch in 2007 transformed their business in two ways. Dramatically accelerated their growth, almost doubled with the launch of the iPHONE. More importantly, it changed the company from desktop radio to being more like traditional radio, listening in the car, or in the gym. They became anytime, anywhere.

* 70% of usage is now on mobile devices.

WESTERGREN says even now, 80% of the time people spend on music listening is on radio -- not stuff they own. He said even with SPOTIFY and other innovations that allow on demand consumption, people mostly want to hit a button and hear some music. He said people listen to both -- radio and subscription services. He thinks music power user will listen to PANDORA, and then by songs on iTUNES, or listen to them on subscription sites.

Regarding Talk radio, WESTERTGREN said he could imagine doing something interesting in that arena, but nothing to talk about right now.

« see more Net News