The Spotify iPhone App

Look out Cupertino, the Swedes are coming. According to a recent article in The Observer, Spotify, the hugely popular Swedish streaming music service, is coming to the America “in the third or fourth quarter” of 2009. In the mean time, Spotify has developed an iPhone app, which is currently awaiting App Store approval, (check out the video demo above, it truly looks amazing). The killer feature of the Spotify app is the “offline mode” which allows you to listen to your playlists when you are not connected to the Internet (if you are on a plane or on the Underground for example). The big chatter on the Internets right now is whether or not the overlords over at Apple will approve the Spotify iPhone app for distribution through the App Store. As you may know, Apple is famously fickle about what gets approved. The $64,000 question of course is, will a free unlimited streaming (and downloadable) music app cannibalize iTunes music sales? (Doesn’t that question kind of answer itself.)

In other Spotify news, according to the Financial Times, the company is about to take on some new financing which would put it’s current value at $250 million:

The Li Ka Shing Foundation, the Hong Kong tycoon’s charitable arm; Wellington Partners, London-based venture capitalists, and others are closing in on a total investment of up to $50m, a bigger amount than expected that values Spotify at $250m (£148m), according to people familiar with the process. [FT.com]