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Tag: Videoverse

  • Minute Media snaps up VideoVerse to sharpen AI-driven sports highlights

    Minute Media snaps up VideoVerse to sharpen AI-driven sports highlights

    LONDON:  Minute Media has acquired VideoVerse, the AI-powered video technology firm best known for its flagship product Magnifi, which automatically detects key sporting moments, creates highlights in real time, and distributes them across platforms.

    The deal comes a year after Minute Media bulked up its sports-tech and content portfolio, building towards a 360-degree solution for rights holders, teams, leagues, publishers and brands. By folding in VideoVerse, the company aims to offer a fully integrated creation-to-distribution-to-monetisation stack.

    For existing Magnifi clients, the tie-up promises seamless access to Minute Media’s distribution muscle and monetisation tools. For Minute Media, it means sharper AI capabilities across its ecosystem, from STN Video to owned outlets like Sports Illustrated and The Players’ Tribune.

    Powered by computer vision, machine learning and natural language processing, Magnifi analyses visual and audio cues to pick out highlights. GenAI features such as multilingual subtitling, thumbnail and metadata generation, and automated workflows turn it into a one-stop editorial engine for sports content teams.

    “We are thrilled to bring the passionate teams and robust capabilities of VideoVerse into the Minute Media family,” said founder and chief executive Asaf Peled. “This is about delivering the very best in AI-powered creation to our partners, clients, and brands.”

    In an industry where speed, precision and monetisation matter as much as storytelling, the acquisition bolsters Minute Media’s ambition to be the go-to tech and content partner for global sport.

  • Saket Dandotia and Alok Patil exit VideoVerse to start their generative AI SAAS startup – Onetab

    Saket Dandotia and Alok Patil exit VideoVerse to start their generative AI SAAS startup – Onetab

    Mumbai: Saket Dandotia and Alok Patil, have announced their exit from Videoverse to launch a new generative AI startup – Onetab. Onetab is poised to offer competitive services in the space of AI-based SAAS solutions. Onetab will provide seamless communication and collaboration with its proprietary custom LLM model, designed to revolutionize the way teams interact and work together. This feature of the start-up sets it apart from the current competition in the market.

    The serial entrepreneurs have partnered with Sonal Dandotia for Onetab. Sonal has been closely associated with Saket and Alok in their prior entrepreneurial ventures and brings her expertise of operations and financials to Onetab.

    According to founder Saket Dandotia, “With Onetab we aim to streamline the communication and collaboration process by consolidating all necessary tools into a single tab. This means that developers can focus on their tasks without the hassle of switching between multiple tabs to coordinate with team members. From API testing to Dev Ops, task management, development, and communication, Onetab promises to provide a one-stop solution, ultimately boosting productivity, minimizing errors, and reducing costs. By eliminating the need for multiple tool subscriptions throughout the development lifecycle, Onetab is set to disrupt the communication and collaboration space.”

    “Onetab has a unique feature, Onetab Insight (data science and analytics), which empowers users to interact with their databases using natural language and receive reports in a visually appealing format, all powered by the company’s proprietary LLM models. With a strong focus on channel partners and a robust go-to-market strategy, the company aims to generate $200 million in revenue over the next three years”, Dandotia further added.

    With its innovative approach and ambitious targets, Onetab is poised to make a significant impact in the realm of communication and collaboration tools. As businesses increasingly seek efficient and integrated solutions, Onetab’s arrival could mark a significant shift in how teams work together, promising a more streamlined and effective communication and collaboration experience.

  • VideoVerse onboards Hemant Agarwal as chief financial officer

    VideoVerse onboards Hemant Agarwal as chief financial officer

    Mumbai: VideoVerse, a leading video technology company dedicated to transforming the landscape of content creation and distribution, is pleased to announce the appointment of Hemant Agarwal as its chief financial officer (CFO). Hemant will be responsible for financial functions, including investments, monitoring acquisitions and overall, worldwide financial planning and analysis, accounting treasury, and internal audit.

    In his two decades of experience, Hemant has led various roles in Finance, Manufacturing & Supply Chain, Controllership roles in India and Internal Audit overseas. He has been credited for leading business transformation and delivering strong business performance whilst establishing robust internal controls.

    As VideoVerse continues to expand its presence on the global stage and accelerate growth, Hemant’s appointment as CFO will help further cement its position as a trailblazer in the video technology industry.

    VideoVerse Chief Financial Officer Hemant Agarwal: “I am delighted to join VideoVerse and be a part of their exciting journey of innovation and growth. VideoVerse’s commitment to pushing the boundaries of technology in video content creation is truly inspiring, and I look forward to contributing to its continued success. Together, we will drive financial excellence, foster innovation, and unlock new opportunities for the company.”

    VideoVerse co-founder and CEO Vinayak Shrivastav: “We are thrilled to welcome Hemant to the VideoVerse team. His extensive experience and knowledge make him the ideal candidate to lead our financial operations. With Hemant on board, we are confident in our ability to achieve new milestones and elevate our company to even greater heights. His expertise will play a pivotal role in shaping the financial future of VideoVerse.”

    Before joining VideoVerse, Agarwal served as the Chief Financial Officer and chief business officer (New Business) at Sesa Care, where he played a pivotal role in spearheading financial strategies, Raising Funds, setting up new business, fostering growth, and ensuring fiscal excellence. Hemant has been a financial expert for the past 18 years with a Chartered Accountant qualification to his name.

    VideoVerse, founded in 2016, is a pioneering video technology company that encapsulates an ecosystem of smart video editing tools using AI and ML. The company’s mission is to empower content creators, enterprises, and individuals to maximize the impact of video content in real-time. With a focus on innovation and cutting-edge solutions, VideoVerse is at the forefront of reshaping the video technology landscape.

  • Lightbulb.ai raises $1.5 mn in pre-seed funding round from investors

    Lightbulb.ai raises $1.5 mn in pre-seed funding round from investors

    MUMBAI: Lightbulb.ai, an emotion AI and engagement analytics platform has raised a pre-seed funding round of $1.5 million from investors Chiratae Ventures and 9Unicorns. The other investors participating include Anthill Ventures and AI-led video-editing company, VideoVerse. The funds raised by this early-stage start-up will be deployed to deepen the datasets for their machine-learning technology & expand the product offering of emotion and engagement insights gathered from a user’s video, audio and speech inputs for a variety of industries. 

    Lightbulb is the brainchild of second-time entrepreneurial trio – Ritu Srivastava, Yogesh Sachdeva and Vishal Soni – who have earlier built and exited Obino, a digital health & weight-loss coaching start-up, that offered health-management solutions across a variety of health conditions. Their successful exit to US-based health conglomerate Roundglass Partners in 2017, paved the way for their next venture. With a minimum viable product (MVP) launch in late 2021, Lightbulb has had an opportunity to validate its product and market hypotheses before zeroing in on its go-to-market (GTM) plans.

    With four patents already in the pipeline and datasets spanning millions of faces across geographies and ethnicities, Lightbulb aims to help businesses that offer remote user experiences, to solve for higher engagement by mapping user emotion & engagement in real-time! From analysing user engagement during live meetings/calls to researching the emotional impact of pre-recorded content and asynchronous user experiences on consumers, Lightbulb offers nuanced solutions that are relevant to industries such as online learning, sales enablement and consumer research. 

    With insights from early customers pouring in, Lightbulb is fast-tracking growth on its multi-modal product & this early-stage capital infusion will help accelerate Lightbulb.ai in building its product & engineering teams, particularly in the fields of data science, machine learning and consumer insights and prepare itself for an early launch in the US market. The company was exclusively advised on this transaction by PepperTree, an advisory firm run by ex-bankers Akshi Mehta & Ankur Goyal.

    Lightbulb.ai co-founder and CEO Ritu Srivastava said, “We are privileged to be supported by some of India’s most prestigious early-stage institutional investors, with vast experience in helping deep-tech B2B SAAS companies build & scale global products in international markets. And are deeply grateful for the trust that they have placed in us at this early stage!” 

    Co-founder & CPO Vishal Soni said, “Customer decisions are emotional & not rational! Since current feedback modes are post-facto, by the time actionable intelligence reaches decision makers, opportunities are lost. Lightbulb enables businesses to measure emotion data & transmit actionable insights to decision-makers in real-time, helping them acquire and retain better.”

    Co-founder & CTO Yogesh Sachdeva said, “Our focus is now on developing a powerful platform that can power significant value-adding emotion ai products with high accuracy levels across ethnicities and age groups & applicability across multiple industries.”

    “Leveraging an intelligent emotion recognition platform through video interaction, Lightbulb is leading the next wave of innovation in this space. We are excited to partner with the founding team at Lightbulb, as they disrupt leading industries like education, banking, mental wellness etc,” said Chiratae Ventures India Advisors founder & chairman Sudhir Sethi.

    9Unicorns Accelerator Fund co-founder & managing director Dr Apoorva Ranjan Sharma said, “While emotion ai is at a nascent stage, it is an exponentially growing technology with a wide variety of use-cases across multiple industries. Lightbubl.ai holds the potential to be relevant across multiple market verticals and that is a strong indicator of how valuable the company will be in the future. As the world becomes more chaotic, the importance of emotion AI will only grow. We are excited to support the team as they enhance the accessibility and utility of emotion AI.”

    “We are excited to support Lightbubl.ai at this stage of its growth trajectory. They have shown great promise so far and we are deeply interested in the solutions that they are building for media and consumer research markets. Media tech is an explosively growing field and we are sure that Lightbulb will be able to make a clear space for itself in this market and scale with speed!”, said Anthill ventures CEO Prasad Vanga.

    “As a company that also harnesses the power of AI, we recognise the potential that emotion AI has as a technology. We are thrilled to be a part of this journey and are confident the team will build a long-term product solution with strong fundamentals,” said Videoverse strategy lead Siddhant Bhandari.