The new Phone Companion app in the latest Windows 10 Builds reveals that big changes are afoot for Xbox Music, Microsoft's music streaming service.
UPDATE: Microsoft has officially announced the rebranding, read more here.
First spotted by Twitter user TimN_FL, the Phone Companion app (an app to connect your Windows 10 PC to your smartphone) reveals a possible new name for the music app. The app describes the capabilities of the current Music app (formerly Xbox Music) in Windows 10, but calls it by a different name: "Groove Music". Microsoft's streaming music subscription, Xbox Music Pass, was also renamed Groove Music Pass in the description.
Curiously enough, there already is a music player called Groove available in the Windows Store, not in any way affiliated with Microsoft. Is Microsoft buy Groove? Or is Microsoft selling off Xbox Music?
Microsoft completely revamped the built-in Music app for Windows 10, due for release very soon, so it seems highly unlikely they're buying Groove all of a sudden.
On the other hand Microsoft consolidated their store experiences in Windows 10, you can now buy Music and Video directly from the Store app, so selling off Xbox Music Pass wouldn't make sense either. Or would it? Xbox Music might be another "though choice" by Satya Nadella. After selling off Bing's imagery collection to Uber and selling off some of Bing's advertising business to AOL, their music business might be next.
So, is Microsoft selling off Xbox Music, buying Groove, or just doing a bad job at rebranding their service? It's hard to tell. We reached out to Microsoft for clarification, but we have yet to hear back from them.
