Microsoft currently offers a music subscription service under the brand Xbox Music. It appears that the service, which has been around for a few years, may soon be rebranded.
If you open up the Phone Companion app in the latest version of the Windows 10 Insider Preview, connect your Windows Phone and then click on the music option, you will see the image above. Based on the verbiage, it looks like Groove Music will be the new name of the service.
The rebranding of the music app is an interesting move, as many would consider the Xbox brand to be strong with consumers, which makes it easier for them to trust based on naming alone. But, if Microsoft is going to re-brand, clearly they see things differently - or it may be that Xbox Music has not caught on and this is a new attempt to revive the service.
If Microsoft does move away from the Xbox brand for its entertainment services, we will be curious to see if they will only reserve that brand name for gaming related items and if it will no longer be associated with entertainment services.
If Microsoft does go down this route, one issue they may run into is that there is already an app in the store called Groove, which is a music player, so unless they secretly acquired this app, there may be a naming issue with the service.
Or, the other possibility is that Microsoft has sold the Xbox Music service to Groove. If true, this would align to Nadella"s "tough choices" that the company is making as it moves into its new fiscal year.
We have pinged Microsoft to get clarification on the rebranding of the music service.