Jimmy Iovine Denies Apple Exit, Says Streamers Must Create Original Content To Compete

"I'm in the band," says Jimmy Iovine, adding that he has no plans to leave Apple. His pushback came after multiple sources reported that the former Beats executive and record industry mogul would exit in August after his final stock vetted and employment contract expired. 

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"fake news"

“I am almost 65, have been with Apple for four years and in 2 1/2 years the (music) service has gotten to well over 30 million subscribers and Beats has continued its successful run. But there’s still a lot more we’d like to do, " Apple exec Jimmy Iovine told Variety, squashing rumors of a summer departure from the company. "I am committed to doing whatever Eddy [Cue], Tim [Cook] and Apple need me to do, to help wherever and however I can, to take this all the way. I am in the band.”

"All this stuff you’re seeing in the newspapers, let me tell you, my stock vested a long time ago. We need Donald Trump here to call it ‘fake news’,” he added.

"it’s not going to scale

unless streaming gets more interesting"

The industry veteran also cautioned against complacency, even as streaming is driving a music industry turnaround: "Everybody’s talking about the great oil gusher, but it’s not going to scale unless streaming gets more interesting.”

The answer, says Iovine, is original content. 

“Netflix has a unique catalog, because they don’t buy HBO and they have their own catalog," Iovine told a Grammy Museum crowd this week. "Then on top of that they have a little thing called $6 billion in original content. HBO has $3 billion, Amazon probably has $4 billion. Well, guess how much original content streaming has: zero! Fundamentally. All the catalogs are exactly the same."