Spotify eases Türkiye tensions with plans to open local office

Last month we reported on a row that had broken out in Türkiye relating to Spotify – and specifically to user-made playlists on its service poking fun at the country’s leader and his wife. This sparked a regulatory investigation of Spotify, and mutterings that the company might pull out of Türkiye as a result.

However, things appear to have been smoothed over now. Spotify will now be opening a local office in Türkiye next year, according to the country’s culture and tourism minister Mehmet Nuri Ersoy. “We will achieve concrete progress in the near future to ensure our country’s music ecosystem receives the support it deserves from Spotify,” he wrote on X. “Spotify, which will open an office in Istanbul in 2026, will further deepen collaborations in this field.”

Ersoy cited stats including the number of new listeners reached by Turkish artists in 2024, and the fact that more than half of their royalties come from listeners outside Türkiye. This data is straight out of Spotify’s Loud & Clear research, suggesting that its lobbying team did a good job in mollifying the minister.