Will M&A bring relief to media startups amid a public-market hangover?

There are several categories of business that venture investors often avoid. Gaming was one, historically, because game-based revenues can be hit-driven and episodic. Media was another.


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The argument against funding media companies isn’t hard to grok — simply compare the aggregate value of all media-based businesses that have received venture backing against, say, the value of just one of America’s Big Five tech concerns.

This doesn’t mean that gaming companies don’t raise venture capital; they do, and web3 fervor has boosted gaming-related venture funding to a degree. Media companies also raise professional private capital, with outfits like Vox Media, BuzzFeed, Substack, The Juggernaut and others attracting venture money at one point or another in their corporate journey.