Apple Music has signed a new agreement with China Mobile, China’s leading wireless carrier with over 1 billion mobile customers.
The deal will allow China Mobile customers to easily access Apple Music. You will be able to subscribe to Apple Music through the China Mobile app or your carrier’s retail store.
“Apple Music is all about the love of music, and we are committed to bringing that love to as many people as possible,” said Wang Gang, general manager of Migu, China Mobile’s digital content platform. said in a statement released Friday. October 18).
“Through China Mobile, we’re excited to bring the world-class Apple Music experience to more people and let them explore the world’s best music.”
He added that China Mobile plans to “combine Apple Music and China Mobile products in various scenarios.”
China Mobile, which is majority owned by the Chinese government, is the world’s largest telecommunications company in terms of reported number of paying users.
Apple Music’s increased access to the Chinese market could benefit the music service, which has until now been a minor player in the market.
China’s largest music streaming player is Tencent Music Entertainment (TME). Its streaming platform includes QQ Music, Kugou, Kuwo and karaoke app WeSing, and counted about 117 million paying users as of the second quarter of this year, and 571 million overall. . Number of monthly active users.
Another major player is NetEase Cloud Music, with 41.8 million paid subscribers as of the latest count.
Although China Mobile does not disclose music subscriber numbers in its financial results, its Migu Music service reportedly has 130 million paying subscribers.
Apple Music’s rival Spotify has not expanded into China so far, apparently due to an explicit or implicit agreement with Tencent Music Entertainment.
The Chinese streamer and Spotify own stakes in each other, and Spotify’s mainland China strategy is “our investment in Tencent Music,” Barry McCarthy, then Spotify’s CFO, said in 2018. .
Apple Music has so far struggled to match the reach of China’s domestic music streamers. According to Daxue Consulting, this is partly due to the limited collection of songs that Apple services offer to the market.
China is known for restricting foreign music in its domestic market, particularly through the censorship of lyrics.
Many of Apple Music’s features, such as podcasts and radio, are not available in China, but the service is “trying to fill this gap” by bringing Apple Music Classical to the Chinese market, for example, Daxue said.
The reluctance or inability of many music and entertainment companies to enter the Chinese market may be summed up recently by Live Nation CEO Michael Rapinoe. He explained that his international expansion strategy excludes China because the market is “too difficult” to enter.
“They don’t let most artists in because they censor all the lyrics. It’s not good business,” Rapinoe said.
That said, Apple Music has the benefit of a partnership with TikTok’s Chinese sibling app Douyin, which also includes membership in Douyin’s Apple Music partner program, Daxue said. .
Apple is also unusual in that it is the only Western music streaming service operating in China. world music business