Shazam: From Music Identification to Media Engagement
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Case Code: BSTR478 Case Length: 17 Pages Period: 2001-2015 Pub Date: 2017 Teaching Note: Available |
Price: Rs.500 Organization: Shazam Entertainment Limited Industry: Mobile Application Industry Countries: US, UK, India Themes: New Product Development, Innovation |
Abstract Case Intro 1 Case Intro 2 Excerpts
Background Note
Chris Barton (Barton), who was doing his MBA at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, came up with the idea of Shazam – a song identification service, using a mobile phone. Subsequently, Barton contacted Dr. Avery Wang (Wang), an audio technology expert with a PhD in audio analysis at Stanford University, to develop the technology.
Wang came up with a solution to turn a particular 10 second sample of audio into a 'numeric signature' or a 'fingerprint'. He created an algorithm, which matched a tune's fingerprint to one of the fingerprints of a song in a song database (created beforehand). The technology disregarded extraneous background noise and bad mobile connections. It also had the capability to recognize different versions of the same song (See Exhibit IV for information on the technology behind Shazam).
It helped that to use the technology, Shazam did not need partnerships with music labels, as only the fingerprint of a song was utilized in the identification process and not the complete song. Speaking on the issue, Barton said, “We were particularly lucky. For the core service [identifying songs] we did not need to have partnerships with the music labels, [because] it was reliant on music fingerprints, which did not require licenses or rights, as they are not actual music." ...
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