Google acquires music playlist service Songza for over $39 million: report

In a recent move, Google acquired the music playlist service Songza for over $39 million, The New York Times reported.

With multiple companies turning to the music business, like Apple buying Beats Music, Google also tried to step in the game. The search engine giant announced on Tuesday that it had acquired Songza, a 3-year-old app that creates a customised playlist of the user's recommended songs.

The New York Times reported, citing an insider that the company paid over $39 million for the deal. However, Google and Songza representatives chose to offer no comments on the said figure.

According to TechCrunch, with the new deal, Google could improve the digital music product as Songza was the only app that could "curate" human experiences to enhance the user's music experience.

The acquisition is expected to help Google improve its ability to offer musical ''curation'' -meaning the ability to generate playlists of songs tailored to each user.

Google's initial target for the deal was $15 million. However, since there were rumors that Songza had been approached by other suitable buyers, Google substantially raised the offer.

"We can't think of a more inspiring company to join in our quest to provide the perfect soundtrack for everything you do," Songza said in a statement on its web site on Tuesday afternoon.

Songza also comes with a concierge service that matches playlists to particular times of day, or to activities, like working, studying or entertaining at home. Thanks to a deal with a Weather Channel Songza can further tailor its music recommendations to a listener's current weather conditions.

The Songza deal is, however, much smaller than Apple's recent $3 billion deal for Beats, which along with its line of popular headphones operates a fledgling subscription service, which offers playlists curated by music experts, The Blade reports. However, most of the purchase price could be attributed to Beats' lucrative headphones business.

The internet company said in an announcement that it had no plans for immediate changes to Songza, but might start incorporating the service into the company's existing services, like Google Play Music or even YouTube.

Songza, which was introduced in 2011, originated from a music download service called Amie Street. The service reported rapid growth, and counted 5.5 million regular users at the end of last year. Pandora, the dominant player in the market for free streaming music, boasts over 75 million regular users.