Pandora’s number of active users grew 8 percent...

platform upgrades including alarm clock, sleep timer and station recommendations. Android app users are listening to Pandora significantly more than before the features were available, he said. Subscription revenue rose to $53.7 million from $18.4 million, according to an 8-K SEC filing. Advertising revenue jumped to $140.6 million from $96.7 million. Chief Financial Officer Mike Herring Herring told investors last spring “there’s a much, much bigger market opportunity in the free side” where far more people are willing to listen to ads in exchange for free music. On the lawsuit filed in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan last week against Pandora on charges of unlawful use of pre-1972 recordings that aren’t covered under federal copyright law, McAndrews said he’s limited in what he can say about the suit, but thinks the “significant value” Pandora brings to artists is “beyond just royalties.” He cited access to more than 75 million monthly active users and exposure to a large breadth of catalogs “that go largely unheard” on terrestrial radio. In many cases, that exposure helps “extend the longevity of an artist’s career,” he said. McAndrews called the landscape of content licensing “a complex topic.” He cited recent rulings that were favorable to the company, including a court judgment last fall upholding the company’s right to perform all compositions in the ASCAP catalog. For the quarter, Pandora revenue grew to $194 million from $115 million in the year-ago quarter, and its loss narrowed to $28.9 million from $38.6 million. Its shares plunged 16.6 percent Friday to $23.51 on what analysts called declining faith among investors about Pandora’s growth story.