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Uber Said to Announce Music Partnership With Spotify

Uber Said to Announce Music Partnership With Spotify

By Mike Isaac, The New York Times | Updated: 17 November 2014 12:45 IST

Uber has long proclaimed to be "everyone's private driver." Soon, those drivers will be able to play your own tunes while you ride.

On Monday, Uber, the San Francisco-based ride-hailing service, plans to announce a new partnership with Spotify, the online music service, according to two people familiar with the companies' plans.

The match is meant to bring Spotify's popular streaming service to Uber customers when they use the on-demand car service, these people said, who spoke under condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the project.

Reporters were sent e-mail invitations on Friday evening to join a conference call with Travis Kalanick, chief executive of Uber, and an unnamed "special partner guest" for an announcement of a "first-of-its-kind partnership." Sources said Daniel Ek, chief executive of Spotify, would probably join Mr. Kalanick to announce the deal on the conference call.

Here's how it works: An Uber customer requests a car via the company's iPhone or Android application. When the driver arrives and the passenger enters the vehicle, he or she will be able to listen to music from their own Spotify playlist inside of the Uber vehicle, these people said.

It is not clear, technically speaking, how the two software applications will work together, or whether a new app will be required to use the feature.

But the project is a marriage between two companies that have eagerly worked with many other Silicon Valley companies over the years in efforts to jump-start the growth of both companies. Spotify's 2011 partnership with Facebook rewarded the music service with millions of new first-time customers. And Uber has teamed up with multiple companies - the National Football League, Morgan Stanley, Starbucks, and United Airlines, among others - to put its car-hailing service in front of as many mainstream consumers as possible.

For Spotify, which has more than 50 million regular users globally, it is an opportunity to bring awareness of the service to even more people. And for Uber, which offers its services in nearly fifty countries, it is a way to offer a more personalized, pleasant ride to passengers - an especially important point as the company squares off against Lyft, another popular ride-hailing start-up fighting for control of the transportation industry.

However, the partnership comes at something of an inopportune time for Spotify, which is in a public battle with the pop superstar Taylor Swift. Ms. Swift recently made headlines when she removed all of her tracks from Spotify's streaming service, an apparent result of a dispute over how Spotify deals with the royalty fees it pays Ms. Swift for hosting her music.

Both Spotify and Uber declined to comment.

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