Music fans might recognize the name Jimmy lovine, as he was formerly the CEO at Interscope records. He came to be part of Apple after he and rapper Dr. Dre sold the incredibly popular Beats electronics business and the less popular music streaming service to Apple. Dre and lovine were paid out $3 billion by Apple for the company. While lovine has been working at Apple since that buyout in 2014, he never took a title with the company and reports now indicate he is set to leave the company.
Sources claim that lovine will leave Apple in August 2018, which is said to coincide with when his Apple shares fully vest. While lovine became an official Apple employee in 2014, he had ties with Cupertino going back more than a decade before. He reportedly met Steve Jobs and Eddy Cue back in 2003 and was a big supporter of the iTunes service and iPod early on, something that was important for Apple.
Lovine was working in the Apple Music streaming service area of the company. Apple Music is doing well with 30 million paying subscribers, even if it is well behind the segment leaders like Spotify. The growth and millions of users are credited in part to lovine and his focus on content including original programming.
Billboard reports that it asked lovine what he would do after Apple during an interview in September 2017. Lovine said then he was focused on getting music streaming up to speed. Lovine has also been vocal in disputing predictions of booming money to be made in music streaming, especially following a report from Goldman Sachs claiming that music streaming would be a $41 billion business by 2030. Lovine said, "I’m 64 years old. I have no idea [what I’m doing next]. There’s just a problem here that needs some sort of solution, and I want to contribute to it. Goldman Sachs may think it’s solved, but I don’t. We’re not even close."
