Big news: For the first time in more than a decade, music revenue has started growing again.

Streaming revenue per year:
1) 2007 — $200M
2) 2017 — $6.6B

YoY growth rate in streaming revenue:
1) 2012 — ↑ 61%
2) 2013 — ↑ 61%
3) 2014 — ↑ 20%
4) 2015 — ↑ 56%
5) 2016 — ↑ 83%
6) 2017 — ↑ 59%

Flashback: #1: The music industry’s 9-figure war for Taylor Swift

The music industry just finished the best year in a decade with $8.7B in revenue w/ streaming accounting for 65%.

Streaming revenue by year (% growth):
1) 2014 — $1.8B
2) 2015 — $2.3B (↑ 28%)
3) 2016 — $4.0B (↑ 74%)
4) 2017 — $5.7B (↑ 43%)

Flashback #2: After Driving Streaming Music’s Rise, Spotify Aims to Cash In

How Spotify makes money:
1) Subscriptions — 90%
2) Advertising — 10%

Spotify currently has 180M users around the world.

Types of users (% of total):
1) Non-paying — 97M (54%)
2) Paying — 83M (46%)

Big question: Can anyone catch Spotify?

Pandora and SoundCloud are making moves with the announcement of a new partnership.

The details:
1) SoundCloud inventory will now be sold by Pandora reps.
2) 100M unique users between the two groups
3) 13% overlap between their listener bases

Video: Pandora teams up with SoundCloud on advertising.

More #1: ‘The industry is demanding it’: Spotify adopts Nielsen Brand Effect for verification on ad platform

More #2: Here’s why SiriusXM is purchasing Pandora for $3.5 billion