A Denmark-based music streaming platform, Moodagent, is betting on artificial intelligence or AI to take on established players like Spotify, Gaana and JioSaavn in the Indian market.

As the name suggests, Moodagent allows users to customise their playlist based on their mood. The app offers five sliders — sensual, tender, happy, angry and tempo — which users can operate to select the kind of music they are in the mood for.

“Other streaming services tend to do what I would call a ‘lean back modality’, where they recommend songs which are at one degree of separation from things that you already know. Whereas our technology has many patents behind it, along with tens of thousands of hours of AI that’s been human-curated. So, unlike a lot of other AI that is just kind of algorithmically derived, we’ve got a musicologist,” George Howard, Chief Marketing Officer, Moodagent told BusinessLine .

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The app is said to track thousands of parameters to come up with song recommendations, including the time of day, life patterns of the user and their engagement with the app, among other things. “So it’s a much more interactive and dynamic type of parameters than just beats per minute and keys,” Howard added.

While the app has only a Western songs catalogue at the moment, discussions are on with Indian labels to bring in more music. The brand also plans to partner with fintech and device wearable brands.

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“We have launched a subscription-based model globally because we are not positioning any ads; we are charging for a premium service,” said Jyoti Handa, Executive Vice-President and Managing Director, Moodagent India. The app charges ₹119 a month.

It currently has the highest number of users in Punjab, followed by Maharashtra and West Bengal.

It offers a 15-day free trial, which can be extended for another 30 days. The idea is to get users to familiarise themselves with app, says Handa.

“Moodagent is not like any other streaming service, where they can just search for an artist or track. It’s basically a set of interactive tools which they need time to play with and understand the power of,” Handa added.

Moodagent was launched in Denmark by Peter Berg Steffensen and Mikael Henderson in 2020. The company is headquartered in Copenhagen with offices in Berlin, Sydney, Delhi, and Mumbai; it aims to be present in over 25 countries by the end of 2023.