Spotify Competitor Anghami To List On Nasdaq: What You Need To Know About The Music Streaming Platform

Spotify Technology SPOT has a United Arab Emirates-based competitor, Anghami, and it plans to list on the Nasdaq via a merger with special purpose acquisition company Vista Media Acquisition Com Inc VMAC.

What Happened: On Wednesday, Anghami, an Abu Dhabi-based music streaming service, announced that it will be the first Arab company to list on the Nasdaq.

Popular in the Middle East and North Africa, Anghami boasts more than 70 million customers worldwide and has partnerships with Universal Music Group UVV, Sony Corp SNE and Warner Music Group Corp WMG.

Vista Media raised $100 million to go public last August, and the enterprise value of the deal with Anghami implies a valuation of $220 million.

Why It Matters: Anghami is yet another global competitor to Spotify looking to gain market share in the music streaming space. Spotify has competed directly with Apple Music AAPL, Amazon Prime Music AMZN and the former has maintained the larger percentage of the market with over 150 million subscribers.

With just under half as many subscribers, Anghami has lots of room to grow but is still less known in the West. By listing on a major U.S. exchange, Anghami will be able to bring North American customer and investor eyes to its product and more easily raise capital to grow its business.

“Being a U.S. listed public company gives us access to growth capital and a global platform that is the best in the world,” Anghami co-founder and CEO Eddy Maroun said in the statement.

What’s Next: The new company plans to list under the Anghami name with the ticker ANGH when the deal closes in the second-quarter of 2021.

Upon closing, Aghami expects to have $142 million on its balance sheet.

“It is also receiving support from the state-run Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO) to develop its global headquarters and a tech and research and development centre in Abu Dhabi,” according to a Reuters report.