Spinning up digital innovation at Warner Music Group

Anyone who listens to music and is older than 40 knows that music consumption has changed radically over the years. Way back when, you went to a store and purchased an album or cassette, and later, a CD; then, with the advent of the iPod, you downloaded an album or a single song. Today, you buy music on a subscription model through Spotify or Apple Music.

While the shift from retail to subscription has been pretty painless for music fans, it has required major change for music labels, which have shifted from being a product-based business to a service-based business.

In the legacy product model, labels managed a physical supply chain, manufacturing, and distribution to a network of stores. Today, with a digital product, artists and labels have a lot of flexibility in what they release, and when they release it. “Artists can release a track at a time or an entire collection,” says Ralph Munsen, who has been CIO of Warner Music Group since 2017. “Artists and labels still do plenty of planning, but we have a lot more agility and are able to respond to the market in real-time.”

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