The advent of the iTunes store led to a monumental shift in how we consumed music and since then, the emergence of streaming services under a subscription model has further changed the music industry. Artists went from receiving royalties for individual album and singles sales to now receiving royalties per stream. Streaming royalties range from as low as $.0033 for Spotify per stream to $.013 with Tidal per stream. With such economics, any delay in payments for artists, especially smaller, independents, can be taxing. Paperchain is an instant payments platform that provides artists and creators with short advances of their funds from streaming platforms without any fees. Structured as a digital wallet, artists receive daily payments from platforms like Spotify, YouTube, Apple Music, Twitch, TikTok, and Patreon and can access these funds through the company’s branded debit card. Paperchain’s infrastructure to enable instant payments is built on Web3 with the company utilizing NFTs that represent aggregated creator content revenue streams and do not have any collectible or art value while its banking services are provided in partnership with Evolv Bank. The company was founded in 2017, completed the inaugural Alchemists Blockchain Techstars accelerator in 2019, and has raised $2M in funding. AlleyWatch caught up with Paperchain CEO and Founder Daniel Dewar to learn more about the business, how the company improves cash flow for artists, strategic plans, and much, much more…
Media
Buywith Raises $9.5M for its Live Shopping Infrastructure Platform and Talent Marketplace
Live shopping e-commerce sales have had a meteoric surge since 2019 in China, where sales went from $62B to $300B last year. The entire global industry is expected to approach $500B this year but only a small fraction ($11B) comes from the United States. A new wave of companies are looking to capitalize on an expected increase in interest in the West. Buywith is a live shopping infrastructure platform that lets brands and retailers integrate live shopping experiences on their sites without any code integration or downloads. The platform replicates the experiential aspect of in-store shopping while creating engagement, attention, brand identity, and an unprecedented distribution opportunity with massive audiences. For consumers, they are able to participate in a social, fun, and convenient experience, while easily accessing all the information they need to make a purchasing decision. Buywith offers brands a self-service marketplace to choose talent to host their live shopping experiences. Early users of the platform include Walmart, Estee Lauder, and Steve Madden. AlleyWatch caught up with buywith CEO and Cofounder Adi Ronen Almagor to learn more about the business, the company’s strategic plans, recent round of funding, and much, much more…
Pressto Raises $1.5M to Teach Students to Become Writers and Become Media-Savvy Through its Tech-Enabled Platform
The future of media and journalism is at a crossroads. The adaption of media to embrace a digital reality has had a profound effect on the industry, allowing independent journalists and creators to build massive scale for the first time. However, with these enhanced distribution opportunities, these same digital avenues have also led to a surge in misinformation. Building the skillset and perspective to embrace this new paradigm is something that needs to start at a young age. Pressto is a media education and facilitation platform for students to allow them to develop the critical skills needed to assess, build, and distribute media through project-based learning. Students, K-12, are able to publish their own digital publications, Zines, and through the guided experience build writing skills, audience development capabilities, critical thinking acumen, and literacy of the media landscape using cognitive behavioral science. The platform is currently accepting new students on its waitlist and is actively piloting at several schools with launch slated for the summer. AlleyWatch caught up with Pressto Founder Daniel Stedman to learn more about the business, the company’s strategic plans, recent round of funding, and much, much more…
Pond5 Acquired by Shutterstock for $210M in Cash
Pond5, the online video marketplace, has agreed to be acquired by Shutterstock, the publicly-traded destination for stock photography and creative assets for brands for $210M in an all-cash transaction.
REDD Intelligence Acquired by ISI Emerging Markets Group
REDD Intelligence, a provider of news, information, and research on high-yield, distressed, and special situations in emerging markets has been acquired by ISI Emerging Markets Group, a similarly-focused provider of market intelligence for the emerging markets.
Stocktwits Raises $30M as the Interest in Investing and Trading Surges
Despite the pandemic disrupting global economic activity, stocks, for the most part, have surged from the catastrophic March 2020 lows. With lockdowns keeping people isolated at home, worrying about their economic futures, many took to day trading and short-term trading, fueled with stimulus and pandemic unemployment assistance. Others joined in on the fun because they were bored. This unprecedented shift led to the creation of retail trading blocs that for the first time in history represented formidable competition to established hedge funds and professional money managers. Remember Gamestop and AMC? The number of shares traded by the customers of large brokers rose from 700M shares a day before the pandemic to 2.9B per day earlier this year. Stocktwits is the pioneering social platform for investors and trading to come together to discuss, learn, evaluate and generate investment ideas. Credited with devising the social dollar-sign hashtag or “cashtag” to represent tickers ($), the platform founded back in 2008 in the midst of a different financial crisis, surged in popularity during the pandemic with traders and investors using the platform for forums, research, trading rooms, quotes, news, and sentiment analysis. Stocktwits now has over 5M active monthly users for its freemium product that offers a number of enhanced features for paid users including proprietary research and access to subscriber communities. AlleyWatch caught up with Stocktwits CEO Rishi Khanna to learn more the company’s mission to build a global hub for investors, strategic plans, and latest round of funding from Alameda Research Ventures and Times Bridge.
Authoritive Raises $5M to Bring Creators a New Distribution Channel: Messaging
The relative stillness of the pandemic left people withdrawing from their patterns of daily life. Many used this time, to work on their personal development to replace their lack of physical contact with others. In fact, the pandemic fueled the growth of businesses like Masterclass by attracting a growing segment of digital adopters with time on their hands to libraries of personal development content from today’s biggest domain experts, thought leaders, celebrities, and athletes. Traditionally creators in this space are largely dependent on video content on these platforms and on social media networks; both mediums require creators to relinquish control. Authoritive is a platform for creators to build and distribute interactive content by leveraging messaging apps that the audience is already using like SMS or WhatsApp. By using messaging, the content can be two-way, unlike video, and more engaging while also being cost-effective to produce at scale. The company launched two years ago and until now has been dependent on revenue to finance its operation. With this funding round, Authoritive plans to increase headcount, offer more creator tools, and build out sales and marketing. AlleyWatch caught up with Authoritive Co-CEO Christy Fletcher to learn more about the inspiration for the business, the company’s strategic plans, recent round of funding from investors that include Owl Ventures, GMG Ventures, Eric Ries, James Beshara, Seraph Group, and Megan O’Connor.
OpenWeb Raises Another $150M for its Online Conversation Platform for Publishers to Build Direct Relationships with their Audiences
There’s been a growing movement towards a cookie-less environment in digital advertising and the general trends towards restricting the use of consumer data are leaving digital marketers, brands, and publishers to re-evaluate their approaches in a privacy-driven environment. In this upheaval, first-party data and first-party relationships are moving to the forefront to shape the future of advertising, and consequently, publishing. Privacy-first, first-party data that is willingly shared by customers over time offers a distinct competitive advantage. OpenWeb is an online conversation platform that allows publishers to host social experiences without being reliant on social networks while building value first-party relationships with their audiences. Founded in 2012 as Spot.IM, OpenWeb works with 1000+ publishers, like News Corp., Hearst, and Yahoo, that represent 100M+ active monthly users in aggregate. AlleyWatch caught up with OpenWeb CEO and Cofounder Nadav Shoval to learn more about the company’s vision for the future of the web, expansion plans, and latest round of funding from investors that include Insight Partners, Georgian, Entree Capital, and Omer Cygler
RecSpot Raises $200K for its Social Recommendation Platform
According to an analysis of Fakespot data, as much as 39% of online reviews and recommendations are fake. With an increasing number of bots, anonymous users, and incentivized reviews, would-be consumers are inundated with often inaccurate and unreliable information. RecSpot is a social recommendation platform that only displays recommendations from friends and trustworthy contacts. Users are able to curate their own personalized list in a centralized destination rather than sending individual messages and going through the disparate experience of visiting dozens of different channels. The company, which just launched, is focused on entertainment at launch, with recommendations focusing on television and film. The company will launch into new verticals including dining, hospitality, shopping, and more. The app is live and available for iOS and Android. AlleyWatch caught up with RecSpot Founder Ian O’Brien to learn more about the inspiration for the business, the company’s strategic roadmap, recent round of funding, and much, much more.
The Infatuation Acquired by JPMorgan Chase as the Bank Looks to Strengthen Relationships with Diners
The Infatuation, a media platform focused on restaurant discovery, is being acquired by JPMorgan Chase, as the bank looks to deepen its relationship with its customer base through dining. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
SmartAsset Raises $110M to Modernize Personal Finance and Drive Leads for Financial Advisors
The importance of managing personal finances came to the forefront during the pandemic as individuals sought to buffer themselves against the effects of COVID and the economy. With the internet, many of these individuals chose to go the self-directed route. Many also established relationships with professional financial advisors. In either case, it’s likely these people interacted with this NYC startup without even knowing it. SmartAsset is a personal finance content engine that distributes content, tools, and calculators related to common, everyday financial issues as well as a customer acquisition platform for the personal finance advisory industry. By using content as a driver of interest, SmartAsset can connect interested individuals with advisors that will meet their investment goals, preferences, and criterion. The company, founded in 2012, now handles over 100M customer interactions per month, is responsible for originating $1.5B in new assets under management for advisors per month, and is nearing $100M in ARR. AlleyWatch caught up with Cofounder and CEO Michael Carvin to learn more about the path to building one of NYC’s newest unicorns, the company’s strategic plans, latest round of funding from investors that include North Bridge Venture Partners & Growth Equity, Citi Ventures, Contour Venture Partners, Javelin Venture Partners, TTV Capital, CMFG Ventures, and New York Life Ventures