Great Hill Partners, a private equity firm, has acquired Kotaku et al for an undisclosed amount of money. According to Variety they paid significantly less than what Univision paid for the bundle of brands back in 2016 (for $135 million) after Hulk Hogan sued Gawker and won.
Great Hill Partners managed to acquire Kotaku, Splinter, The Root, The Onion, Lifehacker, Deadspin, Jalopnik, A/V Club, ClickHole, The Takeout, and Jezebel. Cumulatively the brands reach 100 million unique visitors a month.
All of these companies will be situated under a new brand called G/O Media, headed up by James Spanfeller. He mentioned in the press statement…
“This opportunity comes at a time when the entire digital media category is beginning to be recognized again for its unique ability to meet the diverse content and delivery needs of consumers and advertisers.
“As the largest player in our space, G/O Media is in an ideal position to capitalize on this dynamic, and I am excited to collaborate with a great team that boasts an incredible track record to further expand our reach, add value to our advertisers and enrich our visitors’ lives. G/O Media is already the leader among digital media companies speaking to the 10-to-34 year-old market, and we are confident and excited to see that lead expand.”
According to GamesIndustry.biz, this isn’t the first time that Spanfeller has had a taste of the digital media landscape when it comes to being part of large-scale verticals. He was also associated with Ziff Davis, Forbes, Yahoo, and Inc. Magazine.
Great Hill Partners had a stake in Electronic Gaming Monthly and 1up.com, both of which shut down under their watch, and they also had partial ownership of IGN from 2003 to 2005, and invested in IGN’s parent company Ziff Davis from 2010 to 2012.
So it’s not like they’ve had the best record when it comes to acquiring and building brands within the digital entertainment space. However, they are trying again.
Given their previous stints it’s not unlikely that they would give this current ownership two years and then start closing up or selling off the brands that don’t turn a profit.
Variety also reported that G/O Media will continue to honor the union contracts that were put into place late last year. However, the news of the sale isn’t too shocking given that back in April of 2018 Gizmodo’s CEO had stepped down and Univision began laying off staff. Back in July of 2018 Univision had announced that it was looking to sell off Kotaku, Jezebel, A/V Club, and other Gizmodo properties. So it took more than half a year to do so, but they finally got rid of the baggage on their back.
What G/O Media does with all these properties from here on will be interesting to see, especially given that a lot of people have grown tired of the Gizmodo collective being little more than far-Left regressive propagandists. For instance, last year Kotaku engaged in a variety of misreporting themed around the SJW agenda, even going as far as to misreport on the firing of Jessica Price, Earlier this year they were also involved in leading the charge in misreporting on the Ellie controversy surrounding Overwatch.
There’s a number of other cases involving ethical violations that you can scope out over on the Deep Freeze repository. That’s just a small inkling of some of the issues that people have had with just one of the brands associated with G/O Media.
(Thanks for the news tip Blaugast)
(Main image courtesy of Vinnythecake)
Loading comments…