Shazam posts heavy losses from H2 2013

Shazam belatedly shared its financial information from the second half of 2013. In that six-month period, the music ID program reported pre-tax losses of £5.3 million, up from losses of £1.3 million for the whole of 2012. Revenue for the second half of 2013 totaled £16.9 million, down from £31 million during the first half of that year.

Music Week reported that the spike in losses was due to higher spending on marketing and technology. Shazam has secured several interesting business partners recently, but it’s unclear whether any of those would help turn around the company’s financial situation. Its service was recently integrated into the Siri voice recognition system on Apple mobile devices in the iOS 8 software update, a change which surely required extra effort to prepare, but may take some time to see a payoff in increased use.