Pandora Plays Differentiated Defense

By Evan Niu, CFA – May 23, 2013 at 10:30PM

NYSE: P

Pandora Media, Inc.

With Google jumping into online music streaming and Apple expected to soon follow suit, incumbent Pandora is on the defensive. Can a new "Pandora Premieres" station fend off the competition?

Dominant online music streaming service Pandora (P) recently announced a new "Pandora Premieres" station, which promises to allow users to listen to new albums before they go on sale. That includes both paying subscribers and ad-supported (free) users.

The move could be a possible defensive play at differentiating Pandora's service, seeing as how Google (GOOGL -1.82%) just launched its own Play Music All Access streaming service. Furthermore, Apple (AAPL -2.19%) is also expected to jump in with some type of "iRadio" service once it gets the licensing deals worked out with record labels.

In the video below, Fool contributor Evan Niu, CFA, talks about how much danger Pandora is in.

Fool contributor Evan Niu, CFA, owns shares of Apple. The Motley Fool recommends Apple and Google. The Motley Fool owns shares of Apple and Google. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.