Broadway Video

Broadway Video is a global entertainment and media company founded by Lorne Michaels in 1979 in New York’s Brill Building. It operates as an independent studio that produces and distributes original comedic content for multiple platforms. The company also maintains Broadway Video Ventures, its corporate venture capital arm, which invests in media, entertainment and technology and incubates new businesses, including Above Average.

David Birnbaum

President, Broadway Video Ventures

12 past transactions

Sanctuary

Seed Round in 2017
Sanctuary is a mystical products and services company that creates and delivers astrology-based experiences and tools for millennial audiences. The company develops a mobile application and related services that provide daily personalized horoscopes, live birth chart readings, and insights from real astrologers, along with tarot readings and customized forecasts. Through its platform, Sanctuary blends astrology, AI-powered chatbot features, and other mystical experiences to offer users guidance and entertainment as they explore astrology and related metaphysical tools.

Islands

Seed Round in 2017
Islands Media Inc. operates a location-based messaging platform aimed at connecting college students through various events and activities. Launched in 2015 and headquartered in San Francisco, the platform allows users to create channels, referred to as "islands," for organizing events such as games, sharing class notes, and forming support groups. By facilitating interactions among students who may not already know each other, Islands Media Inc. provides a unique space for networking and social engagement within the college community.

Jellysmack

Seed Round in 2017
Jellysmack is a global creator company founded in 2016 by Swann Maizil, Robin Sabban, and Michael Philippe. It specializes in supporting content creators by leveraging technology and data to enhance their growth across multiple social media platforms. The company employs advanced artificial intelligence to identify promising creators and assists them in expanding their audience through multi-platform distribution and data-driven content strategies. By providing comprehensive solutions, Jellysmack enables creators to optimize their time, take calculated risks, and maximize their overall value in the competitive landscape of social media content creation.

Waggle.tv

Seed Round in 2016
Waggle Ventures, Inc. is a New York-based company that operates an online pet community platform, established in October 2015. The platform is designed for pet and animal lovers, fostering connections between animals and their admirers through digital media. Users can live stream and share photos and videos of their pets, enhancing the community experience. Incubated by Broadway Video Ventures, Waggle has garnered investment support from notable firms including Raine and Lowercase Capital. As of July 2020, it functions as a subsidiary of Nimble.

Poncho

Seed Round in 2016
Poncho Inc. is a New York-based company that specializes in providing personalized weather forecasts through its application, emails, and text messages across the continental United States. Founded in 2014, Poncho has developed a popular chatbot on Facebook Messenger and ranks among the leading weather apps in the App Store. The company not only delivers weather updates but also offers travel reports, enhancing the user experience with engaging content. As of May 2018, Poncho operates as a subsidiary of Dirty Lemon Beverages, LLC, leveraging advanced bot technologies to reach its audience on various messaging and hardware platforms.

MessageYes (formerly ReplyYes)

Seed Round in 2016
MessageYes' mission is to help people effortlessly discover and purchase items they love using their mobile phones. MessageYes is the first platform to offer frictionless e-commerce over mobile messaging for brands looking to engage and transact directly with their customers. Leveraging artificial intelligence (AI), human-assisted AI, and integrated payments, the MessageYes platform learns from customer feedback to make the experience serendipitous to each person and brand. Message recipients simply reply "Yes" to instantly buy from their mobile phones.

FutureFly

Seed Round in 2015
FutureFly Ltd. is a mobile application development company based in Helsinki, Finland, founded in 2014. The company specializes in creating innovative entertainment and gaming software that leverages augmented reality and social technology. With a team boasting over 100 years of combined experience in game and app development, FutureFly has contributed to the creation of popular titles such as Angry Birds and Alan Wake. Their flagship products include Rawr Messenger, an avatar-powered messaging app that enhances communication through animated emojis, and Dubface, a 3D animated augmented reality sticker application. FutureFly focuses on integrating game mechanics with user-generated avatars, allowing individuals to engage in virtual reality-based games and social experiences.

Hyper

Seed Round in 2015
Hyper is a video magazine designed for iPad that emphasizes a minimalistic aesthetic and a curated selection of content. Each daily edition features between six to twelve carefully chosen videos, offering users a streamlined experience focused on quality rather than quantity. By delivering the most relevant and engaging content in a visually appealing format, Hyper aims to provide a refreshing alternative to traditional video platforms.

AIR.TV

Series A in 2015
AIR.TV is a video platform based in Los Angeles that facilitates the licensing, distribution, and monetization of viral videos for publishers and content owners. By allowing publishers to embed videos onto their websites with a simple line of code, AIR.TV enables them to automatically generate earnings from their content. The platform offers extensive video coverage, including local news and entertainment, and provides tools for content owners to search, edit, and publish fair-use clips from various news broadcasts. This streamlined approach helps maximize the value of video content while ensuring that creators can benefit from their work.

Thirty Labs

Seed Round in 2015
Thirty Labs is a New York-based startup studio founded in 2021, specializing in creating innovative video-focused companies. It aims to capitalize on the significant portion of our daily lives spent consuming video content by developing novel digital video solutions through its proprietary online platform.

Quickframe

Venture Round in 2015
Quickframe LLC is a New York-based company that operates an online platform connecting video producers with publishers. The Quickframe platform facilitates the creation of original video content by allowing creators to earn compensation for their work. It also enables brands and publishers to acquire high-quality videos at scale, streamlining the video production process. By reducing the time, cost, and subjectivity often associated with traditional video creation, Quickframe empowers businesses to effectively communicate with their audiences through engaging video content.

Burly Bear Network

Series C in 2001
Burly Bear Network specializes in media and marketing services tailored to the college audience. It operates a leading cable television network, reaching over 5 million students across 570 universities nationwide, along with an online platform at burlybear.com. The company offers tours, live events, and on-campus presence for students and sponsors. Burly Bear produces original entertainment content and is managed by industry veterans including Lorne Michaels' Broadway Video and former NFL/MTV marketing chief Howard Handler.
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