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Tag: Neeraj Bhargava

  • Rainshine Global launches four new fintech businesses

    Rainshine Global launches four new fintech businesses

    Mumbai: The US-based media and entertainment company Rainshine Global has announced the creation of four new fintech businesses including investment vehicle AISTRA Coin, credit solutions provider Rainshine Media CreditTech, premium video-on-demand platform Rainshine DiFa, and digital assets research and advisory services (DARA). These offerings will be anchored by Rainblox, the company’s proprietary blockchain platform.

    Rainshine is creating new subsidiaries for each of these new fintech businesses which will be launched progressively in the next six to nine months.

    Digital tokens: Rainshine will launch its first token under the brand AISTRA Coin, an investment vehicle designed to raise $100 million to finance, distribute, and trade new original content productions and list at global alternative trading system (ATS) exchanges. Rainshine’s digital tokens will create a new asset class for both institutional and high net worth investors, transforming the process of investing in new and high potential original audio-visual media content assets.

    Media credit: The company will launch two new subsidiaries under the banner of Rainshine Media CreditTech, one each for the US and India, to offer credit solutions to the media and entertainment industry. Rainshine is raising $50 million, combining both new equity as well as credit lines from leading financial institutions to initially develop the media credit business and later add DeFi (decentralised finance) tech solutions to broaden the pool of investors.

    Premium video-on-demand (PVOD) platform: The new platform called Rainshine DiFa (direct-to-fans) will provide both a white-labelled solution plus bolt-on to other global PVOD platforms or provide content developers a one-stop gateway to a global audience with fully baked digital marketing, payment, e-commerce, and audience interaction solutions.

    Digital assets research and advisory services (DARA): As new fintech and blockchain technologies collide with the traditional and the new streaming-driven M&E industry, industry players will need considerable support to comprehend, evaluate, and exploit new opportunities. Rainshine’s DARA group will work closely with industry players to help them develop and launch new products globally and ensure that they achieve their fullest potential.

    Blockchain platform Rainblox uses a smart contracts module that enables the creation of both transparency in the monetisation of assets and full execution of the required payments globally.

    “Rainshine is standardising financing and payment processes in the M&E industry that have been overly complex traditionally. It seeks to enhance trust and transparency for investors, content creators, and producers,” said the company in a statement.

    “The innovative offerings from Rainshine will accelerate the growth of its original content business and create new options for financing, distribution, and co-creation of content and fulfil its ambition of creating the next generation M&E company,” it added.  

    Rainshine Global’s founder, chairman, and CEO Neeraj Bhargava said the media and entertainment industry is positioned to become a $ three trillion globally connected industry by 2030 and that the company wants to be at the forefront of enabling the development of a creator-centric industry. “Riding on the second wave of digital disruption, we want to build a future-ready company that not only champions the stories that creators want to tell their audiences but also alleviates their pain points on financing, distribution, and retaining the fair share of their creations. We find ourselves in an exciting period where technology can accelerate growth and restructure the industry in a most positive manner,” he added.

    “The new generation of fintech and blockchain technologies are creating exciting options to finance the rapid growth of the M&E industry and access new paths to distribute globally,” said Rainshine Global, chief financial officer, Kishore Mirchandani. “I am truly excited about Rainshine’s innovative fintech offerings and the potential of RainBlox developing into a fully integrated platform for creator and production contracts, M&E asset fractionalisation and financing, digital assets management, global audience access, and listing in financial markets. Being an innovator in this era is an irresistible privilege that we at Rainshine are eager to embrace and build a transformational company.”

  • Elegance Bratton to helm Hellfighters documentary

    Elegance Bratton to helm Hellfighters documentary

    MUMBAI: Five Fifty Five and Rainshine Entertainment announced the production of a new feature documentary Hellfighters, to be directed by marine corps veteran, and Sundance and Tribeca Film Festival alum, Elegance Bratton.

    The film profiles African American Jazz pioneer and music mogul, James Reese Europe, who was a lieutenant in the 369th Infantry Regiment known as the Harlem Hellfighters, the African American military unit to fight on behalf of the United States during World War I.

    “As a veteran and artist like James Reese Europe, I immediately knew I wanted to tell his story,” said Bratton. “WWI was driven by Europe’s desire for control of Africa – there is a cruel irony in that the Hellfighters believed the only way to gain full meaning of U.S. citizenship was to sacrifice their lives for an America consumed with their own degradation. I am grateful to Five Fifty Five and Rainshine for creating a platform for this project."

    Bratton began making films as a U.S. Marine after spending a decade homeless. He previously directed the documentary Pier Kids: The Life and the short film Walk for Me. His short film Buck premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

    Hellfighters reunites the descendants of James Reese Europe and Noble Sissle (Shuffle Along) to explore their legacies, and features interviews with former secretary of State and four-star general Colin Powell, music director of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and musician Jon Batiste, Grammy award winning rapper Black Thought of The Roots, Grammy Award-winning jazz musician Wynton Marsalis, Zora Neale Hurston Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University Robert O Meally, and many more.

    Chester Algernal Gordon will produce the film alongside Kate Baxter, founder & CEO at Five Fifty Five. Rainshine’s Neeraj Bhargava and acclaimed film producer Sunil Doshi will  executive produce  the documentary film.

    James Reese Europe was born in 1888 to Henry Europe, a formerly enslaved man and employee of the Internal Revenue Service, and Loraine Europe, a teacher. At a time where there was no clear path to prosperity for Black Americans, he would become the most prolific composer of the ragtime era, igniting the Harlem Renaissance and inventing Afro-Latin Jazz, as well as founding the first Black musicians union. At the peak of his music career, he enlisted in the U.S. military during World War I. With him, he brought jazz and Black culture to France and the global stage.

    “The film packs a punch of perspective considering our director’s uncanny interrelatedness to the story. Elegance is a saxophone-playing, Harlem-residing, ex-military, French-speaking student of African American Studies," said producer, Kate Baxter (Five Fifty Five), who after pursuing the story as her next project, found the perfect collaborators in Elegance and co-producer Chester Algernal.

    “It’s not very often you get to tell stories about people whose shoulders you stand on. Without the Hellfighters’ sacrifice 100 years ago, we wouldn't be able to make this film," said producer Chester Algernal.

    Rainshine Entertainment, chairman & CEO, Neeraj Bhargava said, “Five Fifty Five and Rainshine Entertainment recently announced a joint venture to provide a platform for communities globally to tell their own unique stories. Hellfighters, our first production together, is a story that is highly relevant in the current times and a testimony to our vision of bringing meaningful and extraordinary stories to audiences worldwide.”

  • Rainshine Entertainment and Five Fifty Five partner to produce stories

    Rainshine Entertainment and Five Fifty Five partner to produce stories

    MUMBAI: Rainshine Entertainment and Five Fifty Five announce an exciting strategic joint venture, where the two companies will work together to develop, produce, and distribute extraordinary long and short-form film and TV formats, audio podcasts, and extended reality (XR) content for audiences worldwide.

    Rainshine Entertainment is a leading entertainment company that creates, nurtures, and develops content studios, which create fabulous content for Indian and global audiences, and Five Fifty Five is an award-winning UK based media company committed to content worth creating.

    This joint association brings together two passionate minds from the industry – successful entrepreneur, investor, consultant, and Rainshine Entertainment founder, chairman and CEO Neeraj Bhargava, and an award-winning international filmmaker, actor, and creative director and Five Fifty Five founder and CEO Kate Baxter. Leveraging the expertise and strengths of the two companies, this partnership unites them in their common endeavor to offer consumers a diverse and enthralling range of stories that spans genres and audiences.

    Together, the companies hope to provide a platform for communities globally to tell their own unique stories, with a focus on the marginalized, the misunderstood, the overlooked, and the unheard. All this with a strong belief in consumerism being best driven by sustainability.

    Working closely with creative director Kate Baxter and her team from Five Fifty Five, this partnership will be supported by two other key members of the Rainshine team emerging business SVP Kiran Nithyanand and senior product manager Harleen Chadha,

    Setting the wheels in motion, the initial set of IP franchises to be launched through this partnership include an untitled project, directed by Marine Corps Veteran and GLAAD-award-nominated filmmaker Elegance Bratton; an untitled Raoni Metuktire project, directed by Kate Baxter, about the first environmentalist and 2020 Nobel Peace Prize nominee, Raoni Metuktire, and edited by award-winning Eduardo Serrano; and The Dark Lady, based on the bestselling research and book ‘Shakespeare’s Dark Lady’ by Dr. John Hudson. Rainshine Entertainment and Five Fifty Five will also join hands to create a wide range of podcasts, led by Jack Bowman, an award-winning audio fiction writer, director and producer, and Sandra Labady, well-known audio and digital content producer.

    Baxter said, “Working alongside my colleague and friend, Neeraj Bhargava, I am thrilled to see opportunities for Five Fifty Five’s international content to be produced and distributed to a global audience. Our partnership provides a wider platform for Five Fifty Five’s development incubator which includes 50+ creatives across five continents, speaking 30+ languages. Never in history has there been a more urgent and opportune moment for the unheard voices we develop and support to be spread through traditional channels.”

    “We are a team of passionate storytellers with a constant endeavor to offer high quality and engaging content across formats and genres. Staying true to this, we are delighted to partner with Five Fifty Five, a company that echoes what we believe in. This association presents an exciting opportunity to broaden the scope of our offerings and facilitate the global distribution of our combined work to a more diversified audience worldwide,” said Bhargava.

    Here’s a sneak peek into the impressive line-up of content that will be rolled out first as part of this joint venture:

    Untitled project – directed by Marine Corps Veteran and GLAAD-award-nominated filmmaker Elegance Bratton, this is the story of the first African American regiment to fight in WWI, and how they moved the world against all odds on and off the battlefield. The project is a global, music-heavy, action-driven political-commentary that is a highly demanded show in the current social environment.

    Untitled Raoni Metuktire project – Directed by Kate Baxter and edited by award-winning Eduardo Serrano, this is the story of the first environmentalist and 2020 Nobel Peace Prize nominee, Raoni Metuktire, whose village is now in critical danger due to Brazilian president Bolsonaro’s urgency to overtake their land and the Amazon rainforest, for international business deals with the likes of Donald Trump.

    The Dark Lady – Based on the bestselling research and book ‘Shakespeare’s Dark Lady’ by John Hudson, The Dark Lady is a shocking, hard-hitting, truly global true story about the critical thinking of the black Jewess credited with writing much of Shakespeare’s work. Podcasts – Our Fiction and Non-Fiction departments have multiple genre-bending podcasts under development.
     

  • Rainshine Entertainment announces first three investments

    Rainshine Entertainment announces first three investments

    MUMBAI: Rainshine Entertainment, a newly formed media and entertainment (M&E) company announced its first three investments today as it acquired significant stakes in Culture Machine, Weirdass Comedy, and Kinsane Entertainment.

    Founded by entrepreneur and tech investor, Neeraj Bhargava, founder of Zodius Capital, co-founder of NYSE-listed WNS and a former McKinsey & Company partner, the company aims to acquire majority or high minority stakes in digital entertainment companies and work closely with them to build iconic content brands for both Indian and global audiences.  

    Commenting on the creation of Rainshine Entertainment and the three deals, Rainshine Entertainment chairman and CEO Neeraj Bhargava said, “Rainshine will be a key developer of talent, content, and platforms in digital entertainment, an industry ripe for rapid growth and disruption.  We are delighted to partner with Sameer Pitalwalla, Vir Das, and Kurt Inderbitzin along with their respective teams at Culture Machine, Weirdass Comedy, and Kinsane Entertainment, invest in the businesses and help them build iconic and enviable content brands.  We are currently assessing several deals and will add 3-4 acquisitions in the near future to comprehensively address our targeted genres and build a new industry leader.”

  • Kinsane to launch a digital-first kids’ entertainment company

    Kinsane to launch a digital-first kids’ entertainment company

    MUMBAI: Kinsane Entertainment Inc (Kinsane) is ready to storm the kids’ entertainment space globally. A digital-first company, Kinsane will create content for kids aged 2-11 years in numerous languages and distribute that content globally through a variety of advertising, subscription and transaction-based revenue models. It is a global digital entertainment company, co-founded by Kurt Inderbitzin, Indrani Pillai and Saahil Bhargava and angel funded by Neeraj Bhargava and other investors.

    Backed by Bhargava as chief mentor, the company has raised USD 2.5 million from angel investors to launch eight new shows, 100 games and 30 new characters in 2018.

    Bhargava, a serial entrepreneur and one of the several prominent angel investors that seeded the company, said “We are seeing major disruptions globally in the digital media space. Television viewing is gradually declining and content consumption is being revolutionised. According to a parent survey conducted by DHX/IPSOS, 72 per cent of kids across the US, the UK, and Canada watch content on streaming services such as YouTube and Netflix. The digitisation of content has made content consumption global and omnipresent. The next leader in content will almost certainly be born digital and Kinsane aspires to be the game changer in the kids’ content space.”

    Kinsane’s strategy is to create a wide variety of videos and games featuring endearing and original characters that become global, iconic brands.  The goal is to take these brands, established in the digital space, and propagate them further through non-digital channels such as film, television, concerts and merchandising. Kinsane plans to launch over 8 new shows and 100 games featuring 30 new and compelling characters over the next 12 months. The core target markets for this content are the US, Europe, India, Brazil, and China.

    Kurt Inderbitzin, co-founder and CEO of Kinsane, said, “We create content featuring characters that live and breathe and have personalities as rich and diverse as the very kids who are watching them. Kids can view these amazing characters, laugh and sing with them and even interact with them in games, live action, and animated shows, augmented reality and audio books.”

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