Apple’s iRadio proposition can now move forward if the rumored deal with Universal Music and the upcoming deal with Warner is accurate.
This new streaming music service is expected to be launching this summer, and, in order to do that, the computing giant has to have at least a couple of the biggest names in the music recording industry on board.
Talks with Universal and Warner had seemingly stalled because Tim Cook’s company was trying to undercut studios on how much they would be paying for royalties.
Apple was originally looking to pay about half what Pandora currently pays, but, as talks have progressed, the rumors have indicated that the the company has capitulated.
That deal means that the contracts between the parties will likely be neck and neck with what Pandora pays. That still means that the streaming radio business is likely to get a bit of a shakeup.
With the capitulation, it appears that Universal Music Group will be officially signing a deal early next week. Warner Music is expected to be signing their own deal not too long after that.
Those two dominoes falling will make it that much easier for iRadio to go live along the time frame that was projected.
That means that a struggling service like Pandora will have lots to worry about during the summer months. There are still a couple of different organizations that need to come on board, like Sony Music Group.
What seems like a bit of a foregone conclusion is Warner and Universal really have agreed to, in principle, or are close to agreeing to, allow their music to be licensed by another streaming music service.
It’s unclear just how the streaming service would work because this is a company that makes quite a bit of money by actually selling tracks through their iTunes store.
Apple, as usual, hasn’t given many details about the ins and outs of iRadio, so we’ll just have to stay tuned.