According to Reuters, Universal Music has chosen not to sign a long-term agreement with iTunes. This is to provide other competitors with the opportunity to sign exclusive agreements. This would be a huge blow to Apple given that Universal Music Group produces one third of all music in the United States. I wonder if this would be a larger blow to Apple or to Universal given that iTunes has such a dominant position in the digital music industry. With all of the iPods and now iPhones being sold in the U.S., many of the Apple brand owners choose to use iTunes to purchase their music. Will they all go rushing to the competitors once one third of their music is no longer available via iTunes? While there is no way to tell what will happen, this is a huge blow to a company that is now seemingly on top of the world. It will be interesting to see how this story plays out.

2 Responses to “Universal Deals Huge Blow to Apple”
July 2nd, 2007 at 7:57 am
I think its a bluff by Universal, and a stupid one at that. Where else are they going to sell music downloads? They are trying to break the .99 price ceiling. It won’t work.
July 2nd, 2007 at 9:55 pm
This is more of a stupid move by Universal because they don’t like the fact that Apple (a non-music company) is playing such a dominant part in the industry. I don’t think this will hurt iTunes nearly as much as Universal. Sure, it will be great that they’ll be able to negotiate the better deal with Napster - for the 3 people that buy Universal music there.