Spotify boss breaks silence on Harry and Meghan’s axed podcast deal

Spotify’s chief executive has finally spoken out about the end of the streaming company’s deal with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, months after it first made headlines.

The Sussexes’ deal with Spotify, estimated to be worth around NZ$41 million, was canned in June and declared officially over in a joint statement from the streaming service and Archewell Audio.

Meghan had released just 12 episodes of her podcast Archetypes, featuring interviews with her celebrity friends about the different labels women face.

Now, in an interview with the BBC, Spotify’s CEO Daniel Ek has been asked whether Meghan’s output over two and a half years was worth the bill.

Ek’s response was a far cry from Spotify executive Bill Simmons’ earlier this year - he labelled the Sussexes as “f***ing grifters”.

He simply told the BBC, “We thought new innovation was needed to happen here. We thought, ‘We can come in and offer a great experience that both makes consumers very happy and allows new creators new avenues’.

“And the truth of the matter is, some of it has worked; some of it hasn’t. We’re learning from those and we are moving on, and we wish all of the ones we didn’t renew [deals] with the best of success they can have going forward.”

Shortly after it launched, Archetypes became the service’s top podcast and won a People’s Choice Award in December - but sources told Variety at that time executives were expecting more from the deal.

The Wall Street Journal reported the Sussexes did not meet the “productivity benchmarks” needed to earn their full payout at the end of their contract - and it’s still unclear just how much they made from the deal.

The end of the deal may have come as a shock to listeners, but it may have been in the work for months.

On a call with financial analysts in April this year, Ek admitted Spotify had been “overpaying” and “overinvesting”.

“And the ones that aren’t performing, obviously, we won’t renew. And the ones that are performing, we will obviously look at those on a case-by-case basis on the relative value.”

Former First Lady Michelle Obama’s podcast also fell victim to the content cuts last year.

Sources close to Harry and Meghan told People magazine in August the termination of the Spotify deal left them on “unsteady footing”.

After signing the deal in late 2020, the couple reportedly had a difficult time launching the project.

“They were given no formal lay of the land to kick things off, so they were already on unsteady footing even before the ink was dry,” one source told People, insisting that they “have a lot of ideas and did pitch them”, but “things moved very slowly on both ends”.