Pandora controls 70 percent of US Internet radio market
updated 07:16 am EDT, Fri May 25, 2012
Net loss per share advised despite increased revenues
Internet radio service Pandora claims to control over 70 percent of the US Internet radio market. The company's recent earnings report covering the first quarter of the 2012-2013 fiscal year touted details of over 3 billion listening hours on the service by over 150 million users. The net loss for the year is expected to be up to $0.11 per share, despite both subscription and advertising revenue increasing in year-on-year comparisons.
Pandora earned $80.8 million in its first fiscal quarter, a 58 percent increase. Subscriptions contributed $10.2 million and advertising revenue added $70.6 million, raising by 38 percent and 62 percent respectively compared to last year. Listening hours almost doubled for the same measured periods, moving from 1.6 billion to 3.09 billion hours, letting Pandora to a record 5.95% of total US radio listening.
'This quarter Pandora averaged more than 50 million active users a month who generated more than 3.09 billion listening hours across Pandora's multiple platforms,' said Pandora boss Joe Kennedy. '...the majority of the top 50 digital advertisers in the US [have already] bought multiplatform advertising on Pandora,' he added.
However, Pandora is yet to expand to other countries in the same way that competing platforms have been able to. Licensing restrictions continue to stop Pandora from expanding to countries other than the US, allowing other services such as Spotify to gain traction in the US and elsewhere.
