With a 155,000-square-foot studio, Spotify is transforming Los Angeles into Podcast City.
Photo Credit: Spotify
With its new downtown studio, Spotify is transforming Los Angeles into a podcast mecca.
The new Spotify facility can house up to 600 personnel from 18 podcast studios. It contains a theater, an interior stage, and areas where musicians can practice on historical instruments. There’s even a piano that was once owned by Norah Jones.
“We want our teams and the maker community to have a place to call home.” That’s why we’re putting money into Los Angeles. Courtney Holt, Spotify’s Global Head of Podcasts and New Initiatives, adds, “It’s an important city for Spotify.”
The campus features three buildings, including an office building, a building for the stage and conference rooms, and what Spotify is calling ‘Pod City.’
It’s where Spotify will record all of its Los Angeles-based podcasts. It also features a listening room with soundproofing and a cutting-edge sound system. That’s because podcasting gives Spotify a chance to own content it streams, rather than always licensing content from music rights holders.
Spotify has an estimated 28.2 million monthly U.S. podcast listeners. It is estimated to surpass Apple Podcasts’ monthly listeners by the end of 2021, according to eMarketer. While it may have started with music, podcasts will be what sets Spotify apart as more than just a music streaming service.
“This was a really great attempt to try and create the most forward-thinking and future-proof strategy around how we can do production that’s going to be dynamic and nimble to meet the needs of the platform and consumers,” says Holt.
Outside of podcasts, Spotify is experimenting with audio. It bought and launched Spotify Greenroom in March of this year. In November, it bought the audiobook company Findaway. Spotify’s expansion strategy, according to Holt, is to regard it as content-agnostic. “In general, the corporation continues to believe in and invest in the audio industry.”
