Online retailer Amazon is pursuing discussions with some of the top record labels to gain licensing rights related to its newly launched cloud-based music storage service, people familiar with the matter claim.

Earlier on Tuesday, Amazon announced two new service viz. Amazon Cloud Drive and Amazon Cloud Player. The Cloud Drive service allows users to upload and store content like music and videos on the company’s servers and then access them with a Web browser.

Amazon Cloud Player allows users to play the stored music from multiple devices such as smartphones, computers and other Internet-connected devices. However, Cloud Player is not compatible with Apple’s iOS.

Users of the service can enjoy 5GB of storage capacity for free. 5GB of capacity is sufficient to store around 1,200 tracks. Addition 20GB capacity can be purchased $20 (£12.50). However, for some time, the Seattle-based company is offering 20GB of storage for free to users who purchase a digital album from the Amazon MP3 store.

But, Brian Garrity, a spokesman for Sony Corp’s music unit, claimed that Amazon started the service “without a license”.

Amazon admitted that it started the service without license, but added that it didn’t require new music-license rights for the cloud-based music service as storage in the cloud was not different from keeping music on a PC’s hard drive.

But, sources claim that the online retailer is now is in talks with the music labels to avoid controversy by reaching an agreement.