Online storytelling platform Pratilipi has raised $48 million in its Series D round led by South Korean gaming giant, KRAFTON Inc. Existing investor Omidyar Network India and a host of startup founders including Hemesh Singh, Gaurav Munjal, Sahil Barua, Vidit Aatrey, Mekin Maheshwari Amit Agarwal also participated in the round.
Pratilipi will use the proceeds to strengthen its IP acquisition and development across various formats including audiobooks, podcasts, comics, web series, movies and games. A portion of the fund will be utilized for expansion in several overseas markets, said the company in a press release.
The fresh raise takes the total amount Pratilipi has secured till date to $78.8 million. In April 2020, the Bengaluru-based company raised its Series C round led by Tencent.
Entrackr had exclusively reported the development.
According to Entrackr’s sources, Pratilipi has been valued between $250-300 million in this round. During its Series C round, it was valued at around $100 million.
The six-year-old company essentially focuses on text and audio storytelling in Indian languages such as Hindi, Gujarati, Bengali, Marathi, Malayalam and seven others.
Pratilipi claims to have over 3.7 lakh writers and 30 million monthly active readers in 12 Indian languages on its platform. The company competes with ShareChat, Helo, YourQuote, and Matrubharti among a few others.
The company also forayed into web series by partnering with Yali DreamWorks. Its first web series Midnight Lily is streaming on MX Player and YouTube. According to Pratilipi, it plans to co-produce three more series in the next 12-18 months.
With the KRAFTON investment, Pratilipi and KRAFTON will also start working on finding the Pratilipi stories that can be translated into globally successful gaming franchises in the long haul (after 2-3 years).
Avendus Capital was the financial advisor to Pratilipi on the transaction.
This is the third investment by KRAFTON in an Indian company in 2021. In March, esports platform Nodwin Gaming had raised Rs 164 crore from the South Korean gaming company. The distributor of PUBG in India had recently co-led a $9 million seed round in video game streaming platform Loco.
