https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/28/how-spotify-licenses-and-pays-for-music-rights.html

Spotify wants to sell stock to investors — but first it will need to convince them it's worth buying in to the complex process of selling music.

The company, which filed its plans to go public on Wednesday, said it has paid more than $9.7 billion in royalties to artists, music labels and publishers since it launched in 2006. It had 71 million paying subscribers and 159 million monthly active listeners as of December, making it the largest streaming music service across the world by far.