The Story of Spotify to Become a Netflix Series
Netflix will release a scripted series about the Swedish start-up that shook the entire music industry and evolved into becoming one of the world’s leading music services - Spotify.
The limited series is inspired by the book 'Spotify Untold’ by authors Sven Carlsson and Jonas Leijonhufvud - both business reporters at Swedish Dagens Industri - and will be produced by Yellow Bird UK, a Banijay Group company and the production company behind the upcoming Netflix series Young Wallander. Per-Olav Sørensen (Quicksand, Home for Christmas and Nobel) will be directing.
Tesha Crawford, Director of International Originals Northern Europe at Netflix: “The founding tale of Spotify is a great example of how a local story can have a global impact. We are really excited about bringing this success story to life and we look forward to continuing our great collaboration with director Per-Olav Sørensen and the team at Yellow Bird UK.”
At the height of piracy, established heavy-hitters were fighting against where the turbulent music industry was heading. The series centers around young Swedish tech entrepreneur, Daniel Ek, and his partner Martin Lorentzon, who revolutionized a whole industry by offering free and legal streamed music around the world. It is a story about how hard convictions, unrelenting will, access and big dreams can help small players challenge the status quo by evolving the way we can all listen to music.
"I’m thrilled to be making this timely and entertaining series for Netflix. The story of how a small band of Swedish tech industry insiders transformed music – how we listen to it and how it’s made – is truly a tale for our time. Not only is this a story about the way all our lives have changed in the last decade, it’s about the battle for cultural and financial influence in a globalised, digitised world," says Berna Levin, Executive Producer, Yellow Bird.
Spotify, founded in 2006, now has more than 113 million paying subscribers worldwide. Netflix, which got its start in 1997 as a DVD-by-mail service, has more than 158 million subscribers.
Netflix didn’t provide a premiere date.