A Universal Music Group digital executive has said Google would have “a very positive impact” on the industry were it to launch a music-streaming service.
Bloomberg reported on Tuesday the web giant was in discussions with record label chiefs about producing a subscription service which would rival Spotify.
Responding to the rumours in London, Francis Keeling, global head of digital business at Universal Music Group, said: “We talk about for subscription services, the need to have a funnel. Google, with its hundreds of millions of users through search, YouTube with its more than 800 million users, arguably is the biggest funnel we could have.
“Clearly if we could get consumers into a legal funnel through that route and encourage them to subscription, that would have a very positive impact on the business.”
Google’s Android software phones are already dominant in the mobile market, with one million activations each day, meaning if it were to enter the music-streaming business it would already have a major advantage over potential competitors Deezer, Rdio and Spotify.
Those rivals already offer free, ad-supported service and subscriptions service four around US$15 per month.
