Amazon is in the planning stages of a new, much more robust streaming service, according to the New York Post. This new service, referred to as a Spotify killer, will be a standalone offering, separate from Prime Music, which Amazon will continue to offer to customers as is.
The service will cost $10 per month, just like Spotify and Apple Music, but there might be another option as well. Owners of the Amazon Echo might only pay as little as $3 or $4 per month.
Steve Boom, Amazon’s vice president of digital music, will be spearheading the new music offering, the New York Post’s sources said. In October, Boom spoke to Billboard, offering up one reason that Amazon might actually have a good chance at succeeding with the new service. “If I’m an artist and I want to reach fans of my music, and I recognize that people like to interact with music in different ways, we’re really the only place that touches all of the different formats,” he said.
Amazon held meetings earlier this month to discuss licensing deals for the new service, which is planned for a launch sometime this fall. A lot could change between now and then, and the new streaming service certainly isn’t a given, but more competition is rarely a bad thing for consumers.
The music industry stands to benefit from more streaming competition as well. “The music industry wants to see all the tech giants fighting it out to try and really take streaming to the mainstream,” one industry insider told the Post.
