Anindita Nayak
Bhubaneswar, 10 June
As part of its strategy to grow the Indian presence in the booming video streaming market, Amazon has entered into an agreement to acquire video streaming platform, MX Player, Tech Crunch reported.
MX Player, which is promoted by Indian media house- Times Internet, will now be included under Amazon’s current video services portfolio, Prime Video and MiniTV. However, Amazon plans to keep the MX Player brand after buying it.
According to the Tech Crunch report, the deal valued MX Player at less than $100 million, which was way less than the $500 million valuation at which the streamer raised its last capital.
The report noted that Amazon is acquiring some assets of MX Player, but not the entire firm. Post the transaction, many of the top executives at MX Player will move to Amazon. According to insiders, MX Player’s CEO, Karan Bedi, is expected to join Amazon as part of the deal.
The deal culminated in a nearly two-year deliberation between the two firms. Times Internet and its affiliate Times Group have been looking to sell off many of their digital properties in the past years, the report said.
MX Player is one of India’s leading video streaming apps, holding a 15% market share of monthly active users as of April, according to a UBS report.
Amazon’s Prime Video is available to Prime subscribers, while MiniTV is free for everyone. By acquiring MX Player, Amazon aims to attract new users and encourage them to shop on its platform. Amazon has been working to grow its user base in India, especially in non-metro areas. Sony had also considered buying MX Player.
Reliance’s Jio Cinema and Netflix are other top platforms in India. Hotstar has now become part of Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries after Viacom18 and Walt Disney India merged in March. Times Internet bought MX Player in 2018. In 2022, it sold its short video platform MX Takatak to the vernacular social media platform ShareChat.
