Streaming music application Joox, operated by Tencent Holdings Ltd, aims to attract more VIP subscribers to strengthen its audiences engagement and generate long-term revenue.
Krittee Manoleehagul, managing director of Tencent Thailand and an executive of Joox Thailand, said the company aims for Joox to be one of the most accessible music streaming platforms this year.
After only two years in operation, the number of Joox users and downloads has increased continually but the company still wants to attract more VIP subscribers, striking a better balance with advertising revenue, Mr Krittee said.
Some 50% of Joox's revenue comes from VIP subscriptions, and the rest from advertising and branded content.
"Today the number of people opting for music streaming is growing -- almost doubling," Mr Krittee said. "Some 71% of music lovers listen to songs on their smartphones these days."
Last year, Joox achieved 50 million downloads, double the previous year's total. The app is ranked in the top 10 for popularity in Thailand. There were more than 2 billion streams on Joox in 2017.
Listening behaviour suggests that users around the world are keen to create their own playlists to share with peers, he said.
Some 6 million playlists on Joox were created by users.
Out of all the user-curated playlists, 83% are for public access because the curators are eager to share their taste with others, Mr Krittee said.
Overall, users have shared songs, playlists and various content on the Joox application 92 million times. Of the shared content, 13% are user-curated playlists.
Mr Krittee said the TV business is still promising because it is key to reaching a wider audience. Joox will integrate its content to broadcast on digital TV, he said.
WorkpointTV is the only digital TV provider to partner with Joox. Mr Krittee said the company is open to more digital TV partnerships to fulfil its online-to-offline strategy.
For the company's 2018 service delivery plan, Joox aims to serve as a forum where artists and music professionals can promote their work, engage with fans and drive the growing industry.
"We intend to offer a greater variety of audio content and add new features," Mr Krittee said. "Having launched last August, our karaoke feature has already proved a big hit. People have enjoyed this feature nearly 20 million times with us already, which proves that it reacts to the demand of Thai users."
Joox this year aims to expand its reach as an entertainment platform by enhancing content offerings.