Spotify pays $250 million for Ringer, SiriusXM invests 75 million in SoundCloud

Spotify is paying close to $200 million upfront for the Ringer, the growing online sports and pop-culture outlet, as part of its push into podcasting, according to Bloomberg. This amount will be followed by more than $50 million later. Spotify has now spent more than $600 million to acquire four companies that can accelerate its podcasting business -- the Ringer, Gimlet Media, Anchor, and Parcast. In other music business news, Music Business Worldwide reports that SoundCloud has secured $75 million investment from SiriusXM – which acquired another leading music streaming platform, Pandora, last year in a $3.5bn all-stock transaction.