Spotify Hires Barry McCarthy, Formerly of Netflix, as CFO
Spotify made a major staffing move this week by hiring former Netflix chief financial officer Barry McCarthy as its own new CFO. McCarthy was already serving on Spotify's board of directors.
He had worked at Netflix from 1999 through late 2010 and was most recently CFO at a mobile payments startup called Cinkle. Current Spotify CFO Peter Sterkey will stay with the company, a spokesperson told the New York Times.
The hire could also put Netflix on the road to an initial public offering. Part of the rules for filing for an IPO in the U.S. include hiring an experienced CFO. McCarthy was at the helm when Netflix filed their IPO in 2002.
At Netflix, McCarthy collaborated with CEO Reed Hastings to transform the company from a DVD rental service into a streaming giant. After McCarthy's departure, the company further developed into a production house, turning out hit series like House of Cards, Orange is the New Black and Arrested Development.
Spotify has started offering video as part of its service, which it announced in detail at a media event last month. Like Netflix, the company has started dipping its toes into the original content pool with the new Spotify Running feature and collaborations with Nerdist and others.
McCarthy will start the new job on July 6.