Twitter Inc Could Overtake Pandora Media Inc [REPORT]

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Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) may soon beat Pandora Media Inc (NYSE:P) at what was thought to be Pandora’s field of dominance. A recent article from Mike Isaac, where he supported Twitter’s acquisition of Gnip, has been used by Rocco Pendola of TheStreet to prove how Twitter is better than Pandora in fields where the latter could have performed well.

Similar competence, different presence

According to Isaac, Gnip has access to the information all the way back to when Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) began the hosting of Tweets on the web. Gnip has a large and varied customer base and provides them with the information that is useful to them in various ways and for various purposes. For example: It provides day trading firms with financial Insights, marketers and other agencies with customers’ views, opinions, social details and sentiments about their products, services and brands on the web.

Pandora Media Inc (NYSE:P) too has a firehose that has music related data and is as good and useful as Twitter’s firehose. Even then Twitter has been successful at beating Pandora at what Pandora could have been best at. Pandora has music related data that is useful for music lovers, the music industry, major or indie bands and the mega brands. However, management is not able to exploit this opportunity to its favor.

Pandora must act soon before Twitter takes over

Isaac further mentioned that Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) has total revenue of $665 million and about $70 million is generated through Twitter’s data licensing. Pandora, at present, is not in the data licensing business. Pandora’s total revenue for the 11 months ending December 31, 2013 is $600 million of which $490 million has been contributed by advertising while the remaining $110 million has come from ‘Subscription and other.’ They can easily make around $70 million if they too get involved in data licensing, believes Pendola.

Pandora Media Inc (NYSE:P) was the one, who was the early adopter in the data business, but it has failed to maintain its dominant status in this field and is on the verge of losing this dominance soon to Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR). This situation can improve if they too focus on the data because music and radio as pure plays do not have much to offer Pandora in the near future, and they must be used to service the data business.

“That’s why it’s critical for Pandora to act now on data. Twitter doesn’t stream music, but it understands data. And, make no mistake, music is a major part of Twitter’s data business,” says Pendola.

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