Content marketing platform WittyFeed, run by Vatsana Technologies Pvt. Ltd, has raised an undisclosed amount of funding in a pre-Series A round, a company statement said.
The investors who participated in this round include Anand Chandrasekaran, former product head at Snapdeal, Apurva Chamaria, head of corporate marketing at HCL Technologies, and Ritesh Malik, co-founder at co-working space Innov8.
Ashish Toshniwal, chief executive of Y Media Labs; Ajeet Khurana, angel investor; Aneil Mahajan, former chief operating officer at the Bhaskar Group; Piyush Goel, founder and CEO of Beyond Intranet; and Harsh Mani Tripathi, founder and CEO of Pyoopil Education Technologies also invested in this round, the statement added.
The company will use the new capital to strengthen its technology infrastructure, enhance its distribution platform and product portfolio, and expand its sales team.
WittyFeed is also looking to expand further in the US market, which contributes 30% to the company’s traffic. The firm recently achieved an Alexa rating of 17 globally. Some of the brands it services are Zee Network, Tinder, Panasonic, Havmore Icecreams, ITM University, Hyundai, Coke, JIO, Dainik Bhaskar, V Resorts, Burger King, Dunkin Donuts, Droom, Lakeland, Exide life insurance, Career Launcher and others.
“With advertising spends shifting more and more to social and digital mediums, especially towards content and videos, WittyFeed is uniquely placed to attain huge interest from brands and their custodians,†Chamaria said on the investment.
WittyFeed offers curated listicles, charticles, and visual-led content on topics ranging from entertainment, sports, and lifestyle to travel, fashion, relationships, and films. What makes the firm unique is its distribution and promotion model, where it employs paid influencers to share its content. The company also works with brands for branded content and advertising.
In a prior interaction with VCCircle, co-founder Vinay Singhal said that the bootstrapped startup will raise $5 million in a Series A round this year, at a valuation of $30 million. According to VCCEdge, the data arm of News Corp VCCircle, Vatsana Technologies Pvt. Ltd clocked a profit after tax of Rs 93 lakh for FY16, a huge improvement over the Rs 90 lakh loss in the previous fiscal. Total income was Rs 25.9 crore in FY16, up from Rs 2.6 crore in FY15.
WittyFeed was founded in September 2014 by SRM University graduates Vinay Singhal (CEO), Shashank Vaishnav (CTO), and Parveen Singhal (content head) from a small hostel room in Chennai. Headquartered at Indore, Madhya Pradesh, the company claims it has received 250 million page views per month in a short span of three years. It claims to get 80 million unique readers and 160 million video views every month.