KKR-backed Emerald Media pumps $50 million into YuppTV

This capital will be used by the global OTT platform focused on South Asian content, to expand its content library and grow its paid subscriber base.

Emerald Media, a Pan-Asian platform established by leading global investment firm KKR for investing in the media and entertainment sector has announced that it has acquired a significant minority stake in YuppTV for US$50mn. YuppTV a leading over-the-top (OTT) video platform for South Asian content offering live TV, catch-up TV and movies on-demand in fourteen languages across the globe. The growth capital will help YuppTV further its global footprint, expand its content library through original productions and acquisitions, and rapidly grow its paid subscriber base.

Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, YuppTV is an Internet Pay TV platform for South Asians, reportedly reaching more than 400 million households across the world. YuppTV claims to have more than 5 million monthly visitors across 27 integrated devices - with a peak monthly traffic of 20 million. The platform offers over 250 South Asian TV channels, 5000 movies and 100 television shows to audiences globally, with a focus on the USA, UK, Middle East, Canada, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand and the Caribbean. It has over 25,000 hours of entertainment content catalogued in its library, with 5,000 hours of new on-demand content added every day.

YuppTV launched in the India market last year with an initial focus on South India.

Uday Reddy, promoter and CEO, YuppTV, says, "We couldn't ask for a stronger partner than Emerald Media. YuppTV is a content distribution platform with a strong consumer connection, and Emerald Media has global media relationships. We hope to leverage their relationships and existing assets Endemol, OML, Fluence and Graphic India to create original programming and make this platform a next generation distribution and content powerhouse."

Rajesh Kamat, managing director of Emerald Media, says, "Emerald Media believes in driving change and value-creation by providing a distinctive combination of capital, domain knowledge and management bandwidth. The world is moving from traditional consumption to multiscreen delivery mediums. YuppTV provides a unique combination of technology, strong content relationships and revenues of scale and will be an anchor to our vision of building a new age media company."

Paul Aiello, managing director of Emerald Media, adds,"Uday and his team have created an exceptional online video platform with a loyal subscriber base that realises the huge potential of the global Indian diaspora. Our investment and relationship willenable YuppTV to further their strong leadership position in the rapidly growing OTT space."

In September 2015, YuppTV had raised its Series A round of funding from Poarch Creek Indian Tribe of Alabama. The platform claims to have had over 10 million mobile app downloads, in addition to 50 million pre-installs on Samsung TVs worldwide and 300,000+ downloads on LG Smart TV.