Digital video startup Culture Machine raises $18 million from Tiger Global, Zodius Capital and Times Internet

Culture Machine, one of the fastest growing digital video networks in Asia, has raised $18 million in Series B funding led by Tiger Global, Zodius Capital and Times Internet Limited. The company had previously raised $3.5 million in Series A funding from Zodius Capital and Times Internet Limited.

Culture Machine, co-founded by Sameer Pitalwalla and Venkat Prasad, former Disney and Youtube executives, creates digital video entertainment for the Internet generation by combining cutting edge technology with great content. 

"In an multi-screen, multi-platform world where content is personalized and social is the new distribution, creating targeted content for global communities at scale is a challenge. These digital video platforms are the next generation of distribution, and we are building a next generation media company that uses our proprietary technology platforms, to know what content to create and create that content at scale." said Sameer & Venkat, Co-founders, Culture Machine in a joint statement.

Lee Fixel, Partner, Tiger Global Management, said, "Culture Machine Media has built a world-class technology platform and the largest creator network in the country. We' re excited to support the company as it innovates digital content for a rapidly growing audience".

"Culture Machine is uniquely positioned to build "the" leading Media Company for the Internet Generation.  We are very supportive of Sameer, Venkat and the Team given their ability to Produce and Curate world class Content using a cutting edge Intelligence Platform that uses big data to help understand, Identify and monetize what content resonates with which audiences across multiple video platforms", added Gautam Patel, Managing Director at Zodius Capital.

Culture Machine also announced that Chris LaRosa, former product head of You Tube Music, has joined the company's advisory board. At You Tube Music, Chris was responsible to build the vision, strategy, and the products that turned YouTube into the most popular music service on the Internet and a $1B business for artists and labels.

Culture Machine has offices and studio facilities in Mumbai, Delhi, Pune and Chennai and is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Aleph Group PTE Ltd, Singapore.