KKR-backed Emerald Media Acquires Controlling Stake in Cosmos-Maya
January 10 2018 - 10:30PM
Business Wire
Cosmos-Maya, the market leader in original
Indian animation content creation, now eyes global market
Emerald Media, the Pan-Asia company backed by leading global
investment firm KKR, today announced that it has acquired a
controlling stake in Cosmos-Maya through a combination of primary
and secondary stake acquisition. Based in India, Cosmos-Maya is the
market leader in IP-led Indian kid’s animation content. The capital
from this investment will help the company with strategic growth
initiatives and creating global IPs to further increase its
footprint across the world.
Promoted by internationally acclaimed Indian filmmakers Ketan
Mehta & Deepa Sahi, Cosmos-Maya pioneered the art and
technology of animation and visual effects in India. Over the last
5 years, the company has produced a record 1000+ half-hour segments
of animated content. Today, it has multiple ongoing productions
with major television and digital platforms, including Viacom18,
Disney Networks, Turner International, Sony Pictures Network,
Discovery Networks, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and ALT Balaji.
The creators of the Motu Patlu animation series, a popular
Indian kids’ show, Cosmos-Maya has an impressive lineup of 9 TV
shows on air including Shiva, Eena Meena Deeka, Kisna, ViR - The
Robot Boy, Guru Aur Bhole, Chacha Bhatija, Tik Tak Tail and Selfie
with Bajrangi. The company is also working on 3 international
co-productions — Captain Cactus, Atchoo! and Help me Ganesha — in
different stages of production and development. Cosmos-Maya targets
audiences globally through its own YouTube channel, WowKidz, which
has already become one of the fastest-growing channels for kids’
content with over 2 million active subscribers and over 2 billion
cumulative views since its launch in 2016.
Ketan Mehta, Founder and Managing Director, Cosmos-Maya said,
“The vision for Cosmos-Maya has always been to become a
cutting-edge media technology company creating quality Indian
content for the global market. The company will benefit greatly
with a partner like Emerald Media which has a strong understanding
of the entertainment, broadcast and OTT space. Through the capital
infused, the company intends to develop international projects
while leveraging the media relationships of Emerald to expand its
global footprint.”
Rajesh Kamat, Managing Director of Emerald Media, said,
“Cosmos-Maya has created and owns the content for some of the most
popular kids’ shows and hence has its finger on the pulse of a very
captive and influential audience. With the company now focused on
the development of content, that crosses geographies, it is poised
for growth on a global stage — not to mention the added opportunity
of brand expansion and merchandising for its properties. This
investment is a great addition to Emerald Media’s growing portfolio
as it aligns with our vision of creating an ecosystem that caters
to audiences of all age groups.”
Paul Aiello, Managing Director of Emerald Media, added,
“Cosmos-Maya has made great strides in the animation space in the
past few years. Their original shows have been huge successes and
have paved the way for original Indian content to compete on a
global platform. This investment will help Cosmos-Maya achieve its
exciting growth potential.”
Anish Mehta, the CEO of Cosmos-Maya said, "With its successful
and sizeable IP bank, strong business associations, a passionate
team and the constant quest for quality — combined with the
capital, domain knowledge and management bandwidth that Emerald
Media brings on board — Cosmos-Maya is now poised for a global
360-degree approach to grow and monetize its brands through
content, media, marketing, distribution, licensing and retail to
markets, for kids across the world.”
KPMG advised the company on the transaction.
About Emerald Media
Emerald Media is a Pan-Asian company backed by KKR to invest in
the fast-growing media, entertainment, consumer tech and B2B
industries across Asia for which KKR has committed up to $300mm
from its KKR Asian Fund II. Emerald Media is led by industry
veterans Rajesh Kamat and Paul Aiello, supported by an experienced
team of investment and operating executives. Paul and Rajesh
together have a combined experience of more than 40 years in the
industry and bring a unique blend of operational and investment
acumen to their business approach. Since inception, Emerald Media
has made key investments in YuppTV, one of the world’s leading OTT
video platforms for South Asian content, Amagi Media Labs, India’s
leading targeted-TV advertisement solutions firm, aCommerce,
Southeast Asia’s leading ecommerce enabler and e-distributor and
Cosmos-Maya, one of the most successful animation content producers
in Asia.
Emerald Media primarily focuses on providing growth capital to
media, entertainment, consumer tech and B2B companies. The company
looks to support growing public and private companies, by providing
growth capital and strategic value add. For more information,
please visit www.emeraldmedia.asia.
About Cosmos-Maya
Cosmos-Maya is Asia’s leading animation production studio that
produces high-quality 3D as well as 2D animation content. The
market leader in original Indian animation content production the
company has worked on several IPR and commissioned projects for
Television and Digital platforms including Viacom18, Disney
Networks, Turner International, Sony Pictures Network, Discovery
Networks, YouTube, Netflix, ALT Balaji & Amazon Prime
Video.
The studio produces around 600 minutes (30 half hours) of
animation on a monthly basis. Cosmos-Maya has produced over 20000
minutes of original animated content created in the last 5 years,
(comprising of over 1000 half hour episodes) ready/currently on
air. Launched in 2016, Cosmos-Maya’s YouTube channel WowKidz is one
of the fastest growing kids’ platforms with an active subscriber
base of over 2 Million and total view count of more than 2
Billion.
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version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180110006367/en/
For Emerald MediaAshish
Badshawashish@actimediaindia.comorNitika
AshalparaNitika.a@actimediaindia.comorFor
Cosmos-MayaDevdatta
PotnisDevdatta.potnis@cosmos-maya.com