Gustav Söderström at SXSW: How Spotify Survived 20 Years – and What Comes Next, Featuring a Conversation With Lainey Wilson & David Friedberg

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Spotify Co-CEO Gustav Söderström takes the SXSW 2026 stage to reflect on twenty years of building the world's most popular audio platform, and to make the case for where it's all heading next.In this keynote and fireside, Gustav walks through the "mountains" Spotify has climbed since 2006: beating piracy with zero-latency streaming and Freemium, reinventing the business model around mobile at the Gazebo Moment, betting on openness over walled gardens with Spotify Connect, and building one adaptive app for music, podcasts, and audiobooks.Then he turns to the tallest mountain yet: AI. His argument cuts through the noise – the question isn't whether you have AI, it's whether it unlocks a new business model or destroys your existing one. And why Spotify's decade of human taste data is something no general LLM can replicate.He's joined by country superstar and entrepreneur Lainey Wilson and David Friedberg, co-host of the All-In Podcast, for a conversation on building global audiences, the future of podcasting, and what AI really means for artists and creators.Recorded live at SXSW 2026. Spotify turns 20 this year – and this is just the opening note.