Apple to buy music recognizing app Shazam: Report

NEW YORK: Apple is in talks to buy the popular song recognition app Shazam as the tech giant tries to compete with streaming leader Spotify, TechCrunch reported Friday.
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The technology news site, quoting unnamed sources, said that the deal could be announced Monday with financial terms not yet clear.
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A spokeswoman for Apple declined comment.
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Since its founding in 1999, Shazam has offered a high-tech solution to listeners' longtime agony over not recognizing music on the radio or in bars, letting users identify songs through their phones' microphones.
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Shazam, which is based in London, said last year that it had reached one billion downloads on smartphones.
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But it only recently started to see profitability by incorporating advertisements and tying up with other tech firms including Spotify and Apple, to which it refers traffic.
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It would remain to be seen how Apple would integrate Shazam, which also faces competitors such as SoundHound.
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Apple, which earlier revolutionized online music with iTunes, in 2015 launched Apple Music as the market turns to streaming, which offers unlimited on-demand listening.
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Apple said in September that the service had more than 30 million subscribers -- a rapid rise but still trailing industry leader Spotify which said it had 60 million paying users as of July and 80 million more on its free tier.
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Stockholm-based Spotify earlier Friday announced that it and China's Tencent were taking minority stakes in each other -- a likely sign of Spotify's growth ambitions in the world's most populous country, where it is not yet present