Spotify’s going to ‘Higher Ground’ with Barack and Michelle Obama

• Spotify is launching a new series of podcasts on its platform in partnership with Higher Ground, the production company formed by Barack and Michelle Obama.
  
• Higher Ground Audio will find voices within the entertainment industry to showcase on the platform.
  
• David Ostroff is hoping that the Spotify’s new podcasts will appeal to the platform’s global audience.

Spotify, the popular music streaming app based out of Stockholm, is partnering with ‘Higher Ground’ — Barack and Michelle Obama’s production company — to produce podcasts exclusively for its platform.



Publishing podcasts is a new venture for Higher Ground. The company has been producing content for Netflix so far and this will be their first foray into creating audio content. And, for Spotify, they’re going to find voices in the entertainment industry to tell their stories in hopes of inspiring their users.


Higher Ground Audio, an expansion of the original company, will be producing the actual podcasts that will then we available to users on Spotify.






It’s a multi-year agreement between the two companies that will cover a wide range of topics and Spotify’s Chief Content Office, Dawn Osrtoff, is hoping that the type of stories that they plan to share won’t only inspire users in the US or English speaking countries — but connect with their entire global audience.



Globally, Spotify has 100 million Premium users and 217 million monthly active users (MAUs) overall. But in India, the music streaming only launched in late February this year.

The music streaming giant has been trying to get revenue to rise since it’s profits started to stagnate last year. An emerging user base, like India, is the company’s bet to grow and defy critics who have postulated that music streaming is dying out.

This will also help Spotify set itself apart from its competition in India since they are currently the only music streaming service in the space who are offering podcasts to their users.