The economic hardships following the collapse of the corona pandemic continue to hit Big Tech really hard. Latest news is that Spotify is laying off 17% of its staff to cut costs. Let’s crunch some numbers …
From June to September of this year, Spotify:
- signed up 6 million new subscribers, 2 million more than they projected and
- made a profit of 32 million EUR compared to a loss of 228 million EUR in the same time period in 2022.
Let me get this straight. Despite a 260 million EUR turnaround in the past year to enter the black, Spotify is shedding itself now of 1500 “smart, talented and hard-working people” in part because too many of its employees are “dedicated to support work rather than focused on delivering for content creators and consumers.” (Both are quotes from Spotify’s CEO, Daniel Ek.)
Hmm. A couple of points …
First off, I like the way CNN refers to it as “eking” out a profit of “just” 32 million EUR. Now when talking about that kind of money, the word “eking” simply doesn’t belong and the word “just” should only be used in the context of “just the kind of money I’d like to be making.”
Second, doesn’t “delivering” for content creator and consumers count as supporting them?
All seems a little tone deaf for a music-streaming company, doesn’t it?
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