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December 22, 2009

Shazam Heads for 100M Paid Users and IPO...

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mocoNews:

one month on, the $4.99 (£2.99) Shazam Encore is #2 in iTunes paid music apps chart, the same position as was occupied by the free equivalent. It’s a freemium strategy that appears to be working. Shazam CEO Andrew Fisher won’t detail numbers but tells us: “The uptake of Encore has exceeded our expectations.”

What proportion of free-to-paid would Shazam like to see? “It’s too early to say,” Fisher says. The company will today announce a targeted Christmas iPhone discount, to $2.99 (£1.79), to drive subs.

Shazam is looking promising. Already profitable before 2009 began and available in over 150 countries, it ends the year having achieved its target of building an impressive 50 million users, and Fisher is sticking to the aim, detailed to us in May, of doubling that in 12 months.

“We’ve been achieving 500,000 new users every week since January,” Fisher says.

And he’s not shying from October’s talk of an IPO. “Before now, I’d have said it’s not appropriate for a company the size of Shazam. But for us now, given the size we’re at and the opportunity we see in front of us, once you exceed 100 million users, you are significant.




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