Deals
Pandora CEO, Pressured to Sell, Gets Last Chance to Beat Spotify
- Music streaming app is best shot to spur growth, cut losses
- Activist Corvex with 8.8% stake urges company to weigh options
This article is for subscribers only.
Pandora Media Inc. co-founder Tim Westergren took over for his second run as chief executive officer in March 2016 to revive the online radio company and avert a potential sale. A year in, he’s about to take his best shot at proving Pandora can survive on its own.
Pandora is poised to introduce a new service, dubbed Premium, that offers customers millions of songs on demand for $9.99 a month. To succeed against the industry’s dominant players, Spotify Ltd. and Apple Inc., the Oakland, California-based company will have to convince some of its 81 million users to trade their free, customized radio stations for this a la carte buffet.