Oliver Schusser is the Vice President of Apple Music & International Content at the Cupertino, CA-headquartered Apple Inc.
He began his entertainment career at Universal Studios Television.
Schusser has worked at Apple in various capacities since 2004.
Oliver Schusser: Career history
Oliver Schusser started out his career in entertainment when he was hired as the Director of Universal Studios Television. In this role, Schusser managed and oversaw all of Universal Studios’ television productions, distribution, and marketing. He worked with Universal from 1996-1998.
Schusser proceeded to take the Senior Director position at BMG Entertainment, providing him a larger platform but with similar job criteria as before. He remained with Bertelsmann for three years until 2001.
After leaving BMG, Schusser was hired by Napster to be their Vice President of Marketing. At the time, Napster was still a peer-to-peer service which was notorious for MP3 piracy. Schusser joined the company during a time in which US Federal courts had ordered the company to block the transfer of copyrighted material, in turn crippling the company. They rebranded into a subscription-esque service model, but piracy reigned supreme on other platforms including Limewire. Schusser left Napster in 2003.
After his two years with Napster, Schusser began a short, one-year stint with Vodafone as a Global Senior Director. Shortly thereafter, though, Schusser joined Apple as a Vice President of iTunes International. The company tasked him with expanding iTunes into Europe, which he succeeded in. He also played a key role in negotiating Apple’s acquisition of Shazam for $400 million. Schusser remained in this international-focused role until 2018.
Schusser was then promoted to Vice President of Apple Music and International Content, making him the global head of Apple Music and all of the company’s music operations. Schusser became Apple Music’s leading man at a time when the platform was outpacing Spotify in subscriber growth.
His responsibilities also include managing dozens of Apple Music international teams.
In 2020, Schusser took the head position at Beats Headphones. He continues to simultaneously run both Beats and Apple Music.Music Business Worldwide