>> "Beats Music had only 111,000 subscribers as of March [1]. Compare that to Spotify's 10 million paying subscribers, 30 million non-paying users, and $4 billi

>> "Beats Music had only 111,000 subscribers as of March [1]. Compare that to Spotify's 10 million paying subscribers, 30 million non-paying users, and $4 billion valuation." I don't see how these numbers are useful. Beats is US only right now and has only been around a few months. Spotify has been around 6 years and is available in a huge number of countries. Also - Beats doesn't have a free option which will probably stop a lot of people trying it. At this point it doesn't really matter. Apple is late enough to the game that they don't have time to wait another 2 years while they build a good streaming service. Purchasing was the only way to get to market fast and what better than an established music brand, with the deals and software, just launched so that they can make whatever changes they want without too much uproar. The money the headphone business makes for Beats really helps justify the deal though. Even if things flop with the music streaming service they can make their $3bn back relatively quickly through headphone sales.