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SoftBank to buy VC-backed online video site DramaFever

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Japanese telecom giant SoftBank has agreed to buy DramaFever, a streaming video service that specializes in Korean TV shows and movies. Financial details were not disclosed.

Since it was set up in 2009, the company has raised $12 million from investors including SoftBank Ventures, MK Capital, NALA Investments, AMC Networks, German media player Bertelsmann and YouTude co-founder Steve Chen.

DramaFever describes itself as the largest online platform for premium international television shows and movies, with content from over 70 broadcasters and studios in Asia, Europe and the US. Its library includes 700 titles and 15,000 episodes, which is made available for users worldwide using subtitles.

DramaFever also syndicates a portion of its library to Hulu, Netflix, Amazon and iTunes, with more than 20 million monthly viewers.

"In five short years since going live, DramaFever has built an impressive internet-based streaming video business operating at scale. [Co-founders] Seung Bak and Suk Park have a proven business model in a dynamic industry, and we look forward to helping them bring their highly popular video content to an even larger global audience," Nikesh Arora, vice chairman of SoftBank Corp, said in a statement.

The deal comes after SoftBank made a $250 million investment in Legendary Entertainment earlier this month. The telecom and internet conglomerate had also reportedly been in talks to buy DreamWroks Animation for $3.4 million.

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