It’s been sink or swim for Pandora these past few months and it looks like they’re ‘out there like Michael Phelps’ with two savvy business moves that give them a strong injection of capital to work with. Firstly, they received a strong investment of $480million from satellite radio company Sirius XM and then offloaded prized ticketing asset to Ticketfly to Eventbrite for $200 million bringing in close to $700million in capital.
SiriusXM’s investment came at a cost of Pandora selling a 16% ownership share to their streaming competitors. Though the proposed SiriusXM buyout of Pandora never happened, Sirius will nevertheless be pleased to make some headway into the internet radio service. SiriusXM has also been given three spots on Pandora’s 9-man board including the role of Chairman.
SiriusXM CEO Jim Meyer called it a “unique opportunity” for the company to “create value for its stockholders by investing in the leader in the ad-supported digital radio business, a space where SiriusXM does not play today.”
With regards to Ticketfly, Pandora managed to offload the ticketing company which it had purchased Q32015 for $450 million. While that acquisition never really panned out for them, new parent company Eventbrite is looking to establish a bigger foothold in the event marketing and ticketing industry. Eventbrite and Pandora will also enter into a partnership per the terms of sale.
Per Julia Hartz, CEO of Eventbrite, “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and we see immense alignment and opportunity with this union, especially as we continue to expand Eventbrite’s global footprint in music. Together with Ticketfly, we will focus our collective energy on further developing our unparalleled solution and superior services for indie music venues and promoters around the world.”
Though Pandora investors will definitely be boosted by the flurry of financial moves over the last 24 hours or so, it remains to be seen how Pandora looks to fight back against Spotify and Apple Music over the coming few years.
H/T: Tech Crunch
