Rapper Jay Z has acquired Aspiro, a Swedish music streaming company through his business entity, Project Panther.
The deal, which was first sought in January, was finalized Wednesday for $56 million, Fast Company reports.
Jay Z, 45, hosted a group of superstars at an all day meeting just days before the Grammy Awards in February at an event space in northeast Los Angeles near Pasadena so that they would go undetected by press, according to ShowBiz 411. The guests reportedly included Madonna, Kanye West, Daft Punk, Nicki Minaj, Coldplay’s Chris Martin, Jack White, Beyoncé and Rihanna.
The subject of the meeting was how to turn Aspiro into a streaming music and video service that will allow artists to profit from their work and put out quality work, ShowBiz 411 notes.
It’s currently unclear what Jay Z will do with Aspiro, which is trademarked in Sweden and streamed through WiMP and Tidal in the United States, but it appears that he may have an interest in doing something with high-definition audio, which will give other streaming services such as Spotify, Pandora, YouTube and iTunes some competition, The New York Times notes.
Image Courtesy ACE/INFPhoto.com