Another day, another unicorn. Amagi, a cloud-based SaaS technology for broadcast and connected TV, on Wednesday turned unicorn after raising $95 million in latest funding round.
The funding round followed a 108 per cent year-on-year (YoY) growth in the company's revenue. The round was led by Accel with participation from existing investors Norwest Venture Partners and Avataar Ventures, the company said in a statement.
This latest investment brings Amagi’s valuation to more than $1 billion, making it a unicorn and one of the highest-valued media tech companies worldwide, the company stated.
The term "unicorn" describes a privately-owned start-up with a valuation of over $1 billion. The term was introduced by venture capital investor, Aileen Lee, in 2013 to describe rare tech start-ups that were valued at more than $1 billion.
Amagi joins the likes of open source start-up Hasura, edtech firm Lead School, direct-to-consumer brand Mamaearth, analytics platform Fractal, social commerce platform Dealshare, and HR tech player Darwinbox in the unicorn list.
The company offers creation, distribution, and monetisation of live, linear, and on-demand channels across cable, OTT, and CTV-led Free Ad-supported Streaming TV (FAST) platforms, worldwide.
The company further stated that the funding will enable it to accelerate business expansion, both in terms of Amagi's international footprint, as well as its product portfolio in the current media and entertainment (M&E) market, adding that it will increase sales and marketing by fivefold across the globe.
"This is a crucial juncture for our business as we look to hit a hyper growth trajectory by creating a winning combination of goals, processes, team structures and more," Amagi CEO and co-founder Baskar Subramanian said, adding, "We look forward to leveraging their astute understanding of the B2B SaaS landscape to successfully navigate the market intricacies and position ourselves for sustained success in the coming years."
"... Amagi is leading the booming M&E industry to greater heights of technological innovation and strategic growth," said Shekhar Kirani, Partner, Accel.
Amagi, which has presence in New York, Los Angeles, Toronto, London, Paris, Singapore, broadcast operations in New Delhi, and an innovation center in Bangalore, reported 108 per cent YoY revenue growth driven by demand for its "best-in-breed products and Free Ad-supported Streaming TV (FAST) partnerships".
The company also claimed that it saw 59 per cent surge in customers onboarded in 2021 and 112 per cent YoY growth in ad impressions generated using its ad insertion platform, Amagi THUNDERSTORM.
Amagi's marquee customers from across every segment include large media conglomerates (NBCUniversal, Paramount, A+E Networks UK & more), connected TV majors (Samsung TV Plus, Roku, VIZIO, LG Channels & more), content owners (Tastemade, USA Today, AccuWeather & more) and OTT/FAST players (Fubo, STIRR, Redbox, Rakuten TV & more). Overall, it supports 650+ content brands, 800+ playout chains and over 2,000 channel deliveries on its platform in over 40 countries.