James Delahunty
13 Aug 2009 11:45
Tom Group, a Chinese conglomerate, announced on Wednesday that it plans to bring the popular music streaming service Spotify to the Chinese market. The Spotify service comes in both a free (when you can get it) service supported by advertising, and a premium subscription service. Not only does the Tom Group want to make it available to Internet users on a computer in China, but also to provide it over mobile phones, a Spotify service not yet available elsewhere.
"Tom will work toward unveiling a localized version of Spotify in Greater China in the near future," a statement from the company on Wednesday, said. The Chinese government indicates that as many as 338 million people in China use the Internet. Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing owns the majority of the Tom Group, which also counts eBay and Skype as International partners.
According to the Financial Times, Spotify is close to securing new investment from Ka-shing's charitable foundation, which along with Wellington Partners and others will flood another $50 million into Spotify, valuing the service at around $250 million.