Last month, music streaming service Spotify said that it had over 50 million subscribers - an increase of 10 million in six months - helping it to maintain a healthy lead over rivals such as Apple Music. But a job listing on the company"s site revealed that it"s now exploring a new area for expansion: hardware.
A recruitment post seeking a "Senior Product Manager - Hardware" was spotted on its site by Dave Zatz earlier today, and has since been deleted. The job description offered some interesting insights into the scale of Spotify"s ambitions.
It stated that the successful applicant for the role would be "leading an initiative to deliver hardware directly from Spotify to existing and new customers; a category defining product akin to Pebble Watch, Amazon Echo, and Snap Spectacles." It added:
You will define the product requirements for internet-connected hardware, the software that powers it, and work with suppliers/manufacturers to deliver the optimal Spotify experience to millions of users. Above all, your work will affect the way the world experiences music & talk content.
At this stage, we don"t know anything more of Spotify"s plans, including what form factor its new hardware will adopt. Could it be working on some sort of "smart speaker" that works independently of its smartphone apps? Or perhaps a wearable device? It"s possible that the company could seek to carve out an entirely new hardware niche to appeal to music-lovers in a way that others haven"t yet considered.
For now, though, there"s more fuel for speculation than solid details, and after deleting the job listing, and declining to comment to The Verge and Business Insider, it"s clear that Spotify isn"t ready to make its plans public just yet.
Source: ZatzNotFunny via The Verge