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takyon writes:

Swedish telecom operator TeliaSonera has spent $115 million for a 1.4% stake of music streaming service Spotify. In total, Spotify raised $526 million on the funding round that ended on June 9, valuing the company at $8.53 billion. Competitor Pandora Media is valued at $3.5 billion. The Jay Z owned Tidal recently launched but is reportedly struggling.

The announcement of Apple Music has led to speculation that Apple will use its deep pockets and user base to try to crush the existing music streaming services:

One advantage Apple does have is an installed base of 300 million iPhone users. Every iPhone user who upgrades to Apple iOS 8.4 will be able to get a taste of Apple Music for free for three months -- it'll be up to Apple to woo them enough during that period to stay and pay.

[Music industry blogger Bob] Lefsetz called Apple Music nothing more than a "better looking Spotify," however Apple's $9.99 monthly music-streaming subscription service, slated to be available on June 30, is actually a bit more than that. Several of its features are borrowed from Spotify, Pandora, Google Inc. Rhapsody and Jay Z's recently relaunched service Tidal. In a sense, Apple Music combines the best features of each. The app will enable users to stream music from the entire iTunes catalog (more than 30 million songs), download that music for offline listening (currently only an option available to Spotify Premium users paying $9.99 a month), and combine existing music libraries, including songs ripped from CDs, into a single app (Google Music also lets users do this, for $9.99 a month). It will also offer a 24/7 global radio station, curate playlists using a team of humans, rather than the industry-standard algorithms, and produce behind-the-scenes artist content.

Yet, skepticism remains regarding how successful Apple will be in getting people to pay. Only 30% of people in the U.S. indicated any interest in subscription music services in a January survey conducted by Morgan Stanley. Just a third of those people said they would consider paying for a streaming service priced at $10 or higher. Free streaming services have been outpacing digital downloads. "Our survey work, and history, suggests subscription music services will not achieve mass-market ubiquity," Morgan Stanley analyst Benjamin Swinburne said this week in a note to clients. "Free music will drive the lion's share of audio consumption over the long-term." Despite Apple's entry, Swinburne maintains a cautious view on the music streaming industry. His models suggest growth of digital streaming advertising will outpace subscriptions.