Revenue was up, listener hours were up, but the company is still struggling to make a profit. The $115 million loss in Q1 was compared to $48 million in Q1 of 2015. Content costs represented 58% of total revenue in Q1, an increase from the fourth quarter and year over year.
The reasons for the higher content-cost expense were: listener hours growth, the increase in rates due to the CRB ruling in December 2015, and direct publishing deals signed at the end of last year. The company also increased the total number of employees on the payroll by 40% year-over-year to 2,269 at the end of the first quarter, up from 1,624. Pandora has more than doubled the number of employees involved in product development, primarily due to the addition of engineers related to the Rdio acquisition, from 275 to 568.
Take a look at the press release with the financial numbers HERE
