As 2015 heads into waning moment and darkness-filled moments, it has become clear within the music industry that streaming is the way forward. The exact structure of how this will benefit consumers, companies, labels and content creators still needs to be ironed out, but this is quickly becoming the consensus. One such operator, TIDAL has had an eventful year with a high-profile relaunch in March helmed by Jay Z, utilizing musician star-power that backfired and has created expectations that have not been met at the company. There has been a vacancy at the CEO position since the summer, leaving the company rudderless, but now SoundCloud executive Jeff Toig has been named the new CEO.
At SoundCloud he was the Chief Business Officer and before that he was the founder and SVP at Muve Music, Cricket Wireless' music service and was on the Virgin Mobile USA founding team.
Jay Z calls him "a leader at the intersection of consumer technology and entertainment for more than two decades," according to Billboard.
This is the third CEO TIDAL has had during Jay Z's tenure as artist-owner of the embattled streaming service. Andy Chen and interim CEO Peter Tonstad did not last long, while other executives left the company or were fired.
TIDAL seeks to differential itself from other streaming services with more exclusive content, live events and a product that has two tiers of music quality for the audiophiles out there. It has struggled to sell itself as something different from Spotify and Apple Music.
Speaking to Billboard, Toig revealed that nearly half of the million-plus subscribers are the $19.99 offering, which has hi-fidelity sound.
He spoke about why he thinks the company has a bright future ahead of it despite everything negative that has been written and said about it.
"As I evaluated the business and the opportunity, Tidal has a really unique set of assets. It has exclusive content, deep connection with the artists -- A-list artists -- live events like Tidal X, and a unique set of assets. It's early in the game, but the seeds have been planted and it creates a really fascinating foundation."
