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Report: Google in talks to acquire music streaming service Songza for $15 million

Hot on the heels of Apple buying Beats Music, the NY Post is reporting that Google is in talks to acquire the music streaming company Songza. According to the report, Google is currently offering Songza $15 million. That seems on the low side when compared to the $3 billion Apple paid for Beats, although only $500 million of that was for the smaller Beats streaming service. The NY Post also correctly reported on the Beats acquisition before it happened.

Songza currently has 5.5 million active users. Spotify, on the other hand as 10 million, and Pandora has 77 million. Spotify has a $4 billion valuation and Pandora has a market cap of $5 billion. Both of those numbers could potentially be used as negotiation tactics by Songza. Songza also recently raised $4.7 million in funding from Amazon and Justin Bieber’s manager Scooter Braun.

Google, of course, offers its own music streaming service in Google Play All Access, which runs $10 a month. The company has also reportedly been working on building a YouTube-bsaed music streaming service. Should Google acquire the company, Songza would bring its music curation skills to Google, something its Play Music service lacks for the most part. Songza’s entire service based on finding songs for your current mood. The homepage of the service offers a variety of playlists, such as songs for “working in an office” or “boozing your energy.”

It’s unclear how much Songza brings in in revenue, although it has only recently begun looking into advertising. One instance of advertising is its sponsored playlists, which includes things like “Sleeping soundly with Febreze.”

Songza CEO Elias Roman said he couldn’t comment on the rumor, and Google declined requests.

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