[Herald Interview] Ok-pop’s ‘greatest years are forward of us’: Spotify’s normal supervisor for Asia Pacific

Countering considerations of many native music critics who consider Ok-pop has already reached the height of its development, Guatam Talwar, Spotify’s normal supervisor for Asia-Pacific, means that Ok-pop’s greatest years are but to come back.

“We’re a data-driven platform and our information means that the perfect years are forward of us. Extra Korean artists are being found than ever earlier than, extra streams are being generated than ever, and extra royalties are being generated for the Korean music trade,” mentioned Talwar in an interview with The Korea Herald in Seoul on Tuesday.

The innovation within the inventive works and the artistry behind idols have simply now began getting world recognition, he indicated.

“In the event you have a look at artists from Korea, we generated about 5.8 billion month-to-month streams at the moment. These streams are coming from a wide range of markets together with the US, Brazil and Thailand. Korean artists are being found by first-time listeners 2.2 billion occasions on Spotify in 2023 a 12 months alone. It speaks to the ability of their creativity and the manufacturing values of the work,” mentioned Talwar.

Not solely Ok-pop artists but additionally Korean musicians in different genres similar to hip-hop, ballads, rock and authentic soundtracks are trending on the worldwide platform.

“Spotify is a key constituency in constructing this viewers that we are actually discovering other ways to monetize,” he continued.

Spotify, the world’s hottest streaming platform, nevertheless, finds it exhausting to amass a serious share within the Korean market resulting from dominant native gamers similar to Melon and Genie Music.

In an formidable try to draw extra customers, Spotify applied its ad-supported free tier in Korea on Oct. 9.

“The free tier has been a strategic differentiator and pillar for Spotify proper from its inception in 2008. At this time, about 60 p.c of our premium subscribers have come by way of the free tier,” he defined.

Talwar factors out that the platform being an enormous powerhouse with greater than 100 million songs and 6 million podcasts from all all over the world is what differentiates Spotify from different native platforms.

However an important differentiator is Spotify’s effort to proceed innovating its know-how by investing in analysis and improvement.

“In 2023, we spent about $1.8 billion on R&D bills. And, that is nearly a 24 p.c development over how a lot we spent in 2022. AI is one thing that we now have been enjoying with for a few years. You’ll see that in our personalization playlist,” mentioned Talwar.

Spotify gives personalised playlists similar to “Daylist,” which is a playlist that evolves all through the day based mostly on the person’s listening conduct, temper and behavior.

It’s also engaged on participating extra Gen Z listeners.

“One factor about Gen Zs is that they actually crave connection. We’re engaged on it in a number of methods. One is connecting with social media platforms. When you’ve songs and playlists, you’ll be able to share them on these social media platforms very simply. We now have a number of socially linked playlists similar to a playlist referred to as Mix. You possibly can connect with a pal and collectively provide you with a playlist,” he added.

On Oct. 16, Spotify introduced its partnership with Instagram to allow customers to save lots of songs they uncover on the social media platform on to their Spotify accounts.

Talwar hinted that Spotify continues to discover alternatives to accomplice with extra social media platforms to focus on the Gen Z viewers.