2007–2011: Launch
At its launch in 2007, Deezer had not yet secured agreements with major music labels, resulting in a limited catalog. It took over two years for the platform to finalize deals with the four largest record labels, as well as several smaller ones. In its first month of operation, Deezer's website attracted approximately 773,000 visitors, and its popularity grew rapidly over the following years. By May 2008, the service had 2.75 million monthly users, which increased to seven million by December 2009. By 2011, Deezer had obtained the rights to approximately eight million songs.
Despite the high traffic, Deezer almost immediately ran into financial problems. During the first half of 2008, the company saw revenue of just 875,000 euros, which was not enough to pay its licensing fees. In July 2008, the company began running ads itself through advertising agency Deezer Media. In October 2008, Deezer secured $8.4 million in funding from AGF Private Equity and CM-CIC Capital Prive, bringing total investment in the company to $15.8 million.[12] The company introduced mandatory registration in February 2009 to gather more precise data on users, to run more targeted ads, and in November 2009 began running audio ads between songs.[13]
On 5 November 2009, Deezer launched a new three-tier service model. While continuing basic free web streaming, the company also introduced two subscription services: users paying €4.99 monthly received higher audio quality music without ads, and users paying €9.99 monthly gained access to downloadable applications for computers, as well as Android, BlackBerry and iOS mobile devices.[14]
In January 2010, the company's CEO and co-founder, Jonathan Benassaya, was replaced as CEO by Axel Dauchez, after fewer than 15,000 of Deezer's 12 million users signed up for its subscription services.[15] In August 2010, mobile operator Orange partnered with Deezer in a deal to include free access to Deezer Premium, the highest tier of Deezer's streaming packages, with some of Orange's telecommunications contracts in France.[16] Almost immediately after the partnership began, the rate of users signing up for Deezer's premium services went from 6,000 a month to 100,000. By January 2011, 500,000 people were subscribing to the service, and the millionth subscriber mark joined in the middle of 2011, which was half a year ahead of Deezer's expectation.[13] The two companies expanded their partnership in September 2011 to include Orange contract customers in the UK.[17] Also in September, Deezer added Facebook integration to its service, allowing users to send music to one another via that social media service.[18]
2012–2013: International expansion
Deezer was launched in France in 2007, where it was the market leader as of 2017.[19] On 7 December 2011, Deezer, at the time available only in Belgium, France and the United Kingdom, announced plans to expand worldwide during the rest of 2011 and continuing into 2012. According to the company, it planned to make its services available to all of Europe by the end of the year, to the Americas (excluding the United States) by the end of January 2012, to Africa and Southeast Asia by the end of February, and the rest of the world (excluding Japan) by the end of June.[20]
Service was not available across the whole of Europe until 15 March 2012,[21] and service launched in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand on 25 April.[22] On 8 June, Deezer announced availability in 35 Latin American countries, though not in Brazil, Cuba, or Venezuela.[23] On 15 August, Deezer announced it would be available in Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand within several weeks.
2013–present: After expansion
Following this expansion, in 2013 Deezer announced partnerships with LG Electronics, Samsung Electronics and Toshiba, which meant Deezer apps were available on smart TV platforms,[33] along with a new brand identity developed in association with the illustrator mcbess.[34]
Since then, Deezer has made a number of announcements, including its Developer Reward Scheme, mobile App Studio and API upgrades,[35] a new, exclusive beta version of its mobile app for Android users,[36] and the new Deezer app for Windows 8.[37]
