We’re happy to report that our friends over at SoundCloud’s 2017 revenues have dramatically increased from the previous year. Although this is good news for the music streaming online community, SoundCloud isn’t out of danger just yet. After facing what appeared to be inevitable bankruptcy last year, SoundCloud has made strides in the economic arena, exceeding its financial and user growth targets. SoundCloud has additionally surpassed its revenue goal of $100 million, less than a year after angel investors The Raine Group and Temasek Holdings saved the platform in a $150-million-dollar joint redemptive investment. SoundCloud “has never been healthier financially,” says CEO Kerry Trainor.
Trainor’s involvement with the company has led SoundCloud to depart from a business strategy that imitates Spotify’s model, to instead aggrandize its market of up-and-coming music producers. SoundCloud now markets music creation tools to its independent content creators for $70-100 a year, a move that initiates a positive feedback loop in which artists purchase the tools to generate content that they then post on SoundCloud, thus attracting listeners to the streaming service, and motivating artists to continue to purchase the tools from SoundCloud as their listener counts soar.
SoundCloud has and continues to execute a fiscal comeback that aims to situate financial woes permanently in the past, but the platform’s long-term sustainability will remain in question if the company does not devise a formidable plan of monetary attack for the future. For example, SoundCloud’s subscription streaming service SoundCloud Go still remains in its infantile stages and has been strongly turned down by most listeners.
H/T: Digital Music News
