Apple looking to beef up its iTunes team amid ‘overhaul’ rumors

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According to recent reports, Apple is looking at various ways to remedy declining music sales, and better combat the competition. Billboard says the company is considering everything from launching an on-demand streaming music service, to giving its iTunes Store a dramatic overhaul.

And it certainly appears Apple is working on something big in regards to the media manager. A number of iTunes team-job listings have popped up on its website this week calling for iTunes Software Engineers, Senior Software Engineers, and an iTunes Recommendation Platform engineer…

Here’s the description for the iTunes Software Engineer position posted April 10 (via 9to5Mac):

The iTunes team is looking for a software engineer to help build innovative features that will delight millions of customers around the world. The candidate should be a well rounded developer who is not afraid to question assumptions, and has excellent written and oral skills. The ideal candidate enjoys collaborating under tight deadlines and tackles problems with imaginative and elegant solutions.

And here’s a description for the iTunes Recommendation Platform Software Engineer position:

The iTunes Store Discovery team is looking for a top-notch engineer to build and enhance features driving the iTunes Store, App Store, and the iBookstore. The Discovery team is responsible for features such as iTunes Genius, iTunes Match, Recommendations, and many other personalized and cloud features of the iTunes Store.

It’s been said that Apple has seen 2/3 of its high-value customers move to subscription services over the past few years—something that was a major factor in it launching iTunes Radio. And while the service has been moderately successful, only about 1% are opting to buy the songs played.

iTunes Radio (three-up, iPhone 5)

Apple could try fixing this by making iTunes Radio a standalone application, as has been reported for iOS 8. It’s fairly hidden where it is now, and perhaps the added exposure would help to boost sales. The company is also rumored to be working on bringing hi-resolution audio to iTunes.

At any rate, it looks like WWDC could be interesting in terms of iTunes announcements. There’s no doubt that more consumers are moving to on-demand streaming music services, and away from traditional downloading. And as of right now, Apple doesn’t have much of an answer for that.