DANIEL EK, 32
CEO/CO-FOUNDER, SPOTIFY
During the last year, Ek has taken shade from Taylor Swift, watched Apple Music get competitive with Beats 1 and mollified users with privacy concerns. But Spotify remains, by far, the world’s largest music streaming service, with some 20 million paying subscribers and 75 million monthly listeners globally. And contrary to perceptions, it pays the highest percentage of its revenue to copyright holders — $3 billion since 2008, says Ek. Even the expected rise of Apple Music “doesn’t have to be at the expense of Spotify,” claims the CEO, who lives in his native Sweden (but favors lunch on the Spotify rooftop deck in New York when he’s in town). With Apple now streaming, he claims “streaming will start growing even faster.”
NEVER GETS ON A PLANE WITHOUT: “A load of fully charged devices.”
RYAN REDINGTON, 35
DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL MUSIC, AMAZON
In 2009, Redington witnessed the shutdown of his brick-and-mortar employer, consumer electronics chain Circuit City. He has been digital ever since, helping to grow Amazon Prime’s paid streaming service, Prime Music, into one of the major players in the United States. “We don’t specify how many customers are Amazon Prime members,” says the father of two, “but there are tens of millions.” And even if Apple cuts into Prime Music’s streaming market share, Amazon remains one of the largest music retailers stateside, with approximately 8 percent market share counting CDs, vinyl and downloads.
HARDEST BUSINESS LESSON LEARNED “Failure is sometimes part of the road, but it can lead to success personally.”
ALEXANDER LJUNG, 33
CEO/CO-FOUNDER, SOUNDCLOUD
There’s no simpler, more accessible online audio-hosting platform than SoundCloud, created in 2007 by Ljung and business partner Eric Wahlforss, 35. But there’s nothing more complicated, it seems, than negotiating deals with some majors to host their content. While SoundCloud continues talks with Sony — which began removing its catalog from the service in August — and Universal, Ljung notes SoundCloud has created a platform “that enables artists … to get paid, and signed more than 25,000 artists and labels” through the indie label association Merlin and Warner Music Group.
MOST TREASURED POSSESSION: “A refurbished baby grand piano from the 1960s.”