Paul Vogel: Last News

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorSpotify turned in strong numbers for the second quarter, beating expectations for total and paid subscriber adds and reporting 23% revenue growth.Monthly active users grew 19% to 433 million, a net gain of 19 million in Q2 and 5 million above guidance — Spotify’s largest ever Q2 growth. The company attributed the gains to reactivations in Europe and “Gen Z strength in Latin America.”Spotify’s Premium Subscribers grew 14% to 188 million, topping its guidance by 6 million, “aided by promotional intake and household plans,” the company said in announcing results.Click here to sign up for Variety’s free Strictly Business newsletter covering earnings, financial news, and more.Total revenue was €2.9 billion, up 23%, and ad-supported revenue jumped 31% to €360 million, reaching an all-time high as a percentage of total revenue at 13%.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Spotify announced the appointment of Christian Luiga, a senior executive at European defense and security company Saab AB, as its next CFO. Luiga is expected to start in the third quarter of 2024. Ben Kung, Spotify’s VP of financial planning and analysis, will serve as interim CFO until Luiga’s start date.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Spotify said chief financial officer Paul Vogel will leave the company next year and that it has launched a search to find a replacement. Vogel’s last day at Spotify will be March 31, 2024.

Spotify said chief financial officer Paul Vogel will be leaving at the end of March. The news comes several days after the music streamer announced about 1,500 layoffs, some 17% of its workforce.

Ellise Shafer Spotify is laying off 17% of its global workforce in order to cut costs, CEO Daniel Ek said on Monday. According to the Financial Times, Ek made the announcement in an internal memo sent to staff.

Spotify gave an early peek at its two-week-old Audiobook rollout with chief executive Daniel Ek telling investors, “It’s early days, but we feel good.”

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music Like most earnings calls, Spotify’s tend to be a combination of optimism and deflection amid buzzwords like “flywheels” and “toolboxes,” and co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek is among the best at answering direct questions vaguely — a key survival tool for any business head. But Tuesday’s call, arriving against the backdrop of the company’s first-ever subscriber price increases in the U.S., found Ek and chief financial officer Paul Vogel more defensive than usual as they worked to bolster investor confidence in the face of the dollar-per-month U.S.

Spotify CEO Daniel Ek says the streaming audio giant is going to be “very diligent” in assessing future investments in podcasting as several of the company’s rich talent deals come up for renewal.

Spotify CFO Paul Vogel said the company’s decision several weeks ago to cut 6% of its global workforce was a “a real positive” in terms of the company being willing to take a hard look at its operations and “evolve.”

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorSpotify is reducing its hiring forecast by 25% amid broader economic uncertainty, according to a companywide memo sent by chief exec Daniel Ek on Wednesday.Spotify will “reduce hiring growth by 25%,” according to Ek’s memo. The email also said that the company will “continue to still hire and grow” but that “we are just going to slow that pace and be a bit more prudent with the absolute level of new hires over the next few quarters.”As of the end of March, Spotify said it had 8,230 full-time employees globally.At the streamer’s 2022 investor day event last week, Spotify CFO Paul Vogel said that, amid macroeconomic headwinds like inflation, the company was evaluating its headcount growth in the “near term.” “We are clearly aware of the increasing uncertainty regarding the global economy,” Vogel said.

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorSpotify disclosed some key financial metrics of its podcast business for the first time — and while the $1 billion-plus the streamer has invested into podcasting so far has been a drag on overall profits, the company expects podcasts to eventually have a better margin profile than its core music biz.The company outlined its long-term strategy and financial prospects at its 2022 Investor Day event Tuesday.In 2021, Spotify’s podcast business generated nearly €200 million in revenue, according to CFO Paul Vogel — up 300% year over year. About 30% of Spotify’s user base, or more than 125 million monthly users, listened to podcasts in the first quarter of 2022, representing 7% of total listening hours on the platform in the period.

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorSpotify has suspended premium service in Russia after the country launched its war on Ukraine — a move that the audio streaming powerhouse expects to result in a loss of about 1.5 million paying customers in the first quarter of 2022.That’s according to Spotify CFO Paul Vogel, who spoke at Morgan Stanley’s 2022 Technology, Media and Telecom Conference on Wednesday. According to a Spotify spokesperson, the loss of its business in Russia is not material: The country represents less than 1% of total revenue.Vogel also alluded to the recent controversy over podcaster Joe Rogan, which has spurred calls to boycott the streamer (but Vogel didn’t identify Rogan by name).Prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to Vogel, Spotify was trending ahead of its Q1 guidance of adding a net 8 million total users, including 3 million paying customers.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorAhead of Spotify’s earnings call for its second-quarter results, the company’s cofounder and CEO Daniel Ek and CFO Paul Vogel got on the phone for a short call with Variety’s Jem Aswad and Todd Spangler.