Muve Music Passes 500K Customers

Cricket Communications has announced that its Muve Music service has surpassed 500,000 customers since its January 2011 launch. That figure puts it behind market leader Rhapsody, but reportedly ahead of Spotify (who hasn’t released U.S. subscriber info) for the No. 2 digital subscription service in the U.S.

Cricket’s Muve Music is the first wireless plan to include unlimited song downloads, ringtones, and ringback tones from thousands of record labels distributed through UMG, WMG, Sony, EMI as well as independents IODA, INgrooves and Merlin. Services are bundled into the cost of monthly wireless plans, beginning at $55.

The service, which arrived in Tennessee in March, is the first music experience designed specifically for the mobile phone without docking or syncing. Cricket reports that its customers are listening to roughly 40 hours and downloading 300 songs a month individually through the service. Total downloads since the company launched number 500 million and listens are above 1.5 billion.

“We’ve brought a fresh approach to digital music and the wireless space,” said Jeff Toig, SVP Muve Music. “We targeted a customer segment that others are not focused on and designed a world class digital music experience, specifically architected for the mobile phone and wireless network delivery. This is a unique formula in the market today and our success through the first year of operation demonstrates that it’s working.”

Cricket Communications is a wireless services company owned by Leap Wireless and serves approximately 5.9 million customers.