Rdio, the online music streaming service, which competed with Spotify and Pandora, has reportedly tied up with Cumulus radio stations to provide its users with free ad-supported music streaming by the end of this year.
A report by The New York Times reveals that the free streaming might launch as early as Monday, and that Rdio will get a wider range to compete with Spotify and Pandora. Rdio will take advantage of the Cumulus’ radio stations, and would reach to over 525 radio stations to promote itself. In return, Cumulus will manage the ads that are being put in the service.
As of today, Rdio offers free trial of its music streaming service, and charges $5 to $10 per month to get access to its music library. Other services like Spotify and Pandora offer free musc streaming on the desktop version which comes with ads.
Talking about this move by the company (Pulsar Media), Mr. Laner shares that these music streaming services’ biggest challenge is the awareness among people. He also think that everyone talks about this streaming but not many really know about these services.
The deal is pretty huge between Rdio and Cumulus. NYT reports that there will not be any cash exchange between the two companies, but the content, which comes from Cumulus is estimated to be more than $100 million. Cumulus will also take a considerable amount of share from Pulsar Media in this deal.
This is a crucial time for Rdio, since a lot of its users are iOS users, who might move on to iTunes Radio when it launches on September 20th.