Short Video Streaming Startup Quibi Bags Another $750M Before Its Launch
Just before one month of its commercial launch, Quibi, a short video mobile-only app, has announced that it has bagged another $750 million in its second-round funding, which brings its total investment to $1.75 billion till date. As Quibi’s co-founder is former Walt Disney Studios chairman, Jeffrey Katzenberg is the major reason for investors to extensively invest in Quibi, an app that is hardly seen by anyone but with the confidence of its rapid growth.
Though the startup has not revealed the name of the new investors, but it has confirmed that its existing investors include Alibaba Group, major technology companies, studios, financial investors, and strategic partners who also participated in this funding.
Unlike any other major platform, Quibi plans to sell subscribers the idea of top-quality, premium series, and movie clips of only 10 minutes in length. This content is so short and crisp that you can enjoy it while being in a line for coffee or during your brief ravel.
The startup is grabbing the attention by its signature Turnstyle tech by providing an enhanced camera outlook, which changes the view when the phone is switched from horizontal to vertical screen mode.
In a nutshell, Quibi looks ready to give tough competition to Disney, Netflix, and Hulu. However, Jeffrey says that he sees Quibi competing with unpaid-apps that take a lot of time on your phone like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. He is trying to convince investors for a $4.99 streaming service with ads and $7.99 without adds.
According to the Quibi CEO former Hewlett Packard president, Meg Whitman, Quibi will bring more than 175 original shows focusing on contents like talk shows, news, unscripted series, sports, and movies split into bit-size chapters up to 8500 episodes of 10 minutes or less. On the official launch of Quibi, April 6th, almost 50 shows will be available.
In a statement, Jeffrey said that they are competing against free apps and aiming to offer something measurably, creatively different, meaningful, and quantifiable to their users.