Spotify last week confirmed it had completed its acquisition of Findaway, a leading audiobook distributor.
The completion of the deal follows the recent Spotify Investor Day where the streaming firm's CEO Daniel Ek talked about a grand plan to push into the audiobooks sector in the same way the company previously moved beyond music and into podcasts.
Justifying his strategy of recent years to diversify Spotify, so it moved from being a music platform to a much wider audio platform, Ek said that audiobooks were now a high priority, noting: "We believe that audiobooks, in their many different forms, will be a massive opportunity”.
Confirming that the previously announced Findaway deal had now completed, Spotify said that its new acquisition "works across the entire audiobook ecosystem with a platform and offerings that serve authors, publishers and consumers. Their technology will help propel Spotify into the rapidly growing audiobooks industry with substantial market opportunity: the audiobooks market is expected to grow from $3.3 billion to $15 billion by 2027".
"Findaway’s technology infrastructure will enable Spotify to quickly scale its audiobook catalogue and innovate on the experience for consumers", it added, "simultaneously providing new avenues for publishers and authors to reach audiences around the globe. Chapter one begins today".
Spotify’s push into audiobooks was discussed in this recent edition of our Setlist podcast.