Deal focus: Ambit backs digital media transformations

Global appetites for digital media are surging forward, but content providers are overwhelmed. Existing production systems cannot cope with a world in which viewers demand content instantly, through multiple platforms and tailored to their needs.

Easing these worries is the goal of Prime Focus Technology (PFT), which recently gained the backing of Indian mid-market PE firm Ambit Pragma. The company wants to help content producers streamline their methods for producing content and take opportunities that, in many cases, they hadn't even seen.

"We're not just a cost-saving mechanism," says Vikas Rathee, CFO of PFT. "We've automated the process of content creation and transformation, but we've also created new revenue opportunities by enabling this content to be available across multiple devices."

PFT plans to put Ambit's investment - understood to be around $10 million at a valuation of $200 million - to work growing its proprietary enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, named CLEAR Media ERP. The application overhauls production pipelines by centralizing media elements and allowing multiple users to access content simultaneously, eliminating linear production models.

CLEAR also assists with distribution by creating digital transmission channels through which media companies can make their programs available to end users. The model is designed to address creators' concerns about piracy of online content.
PFT's innovative and comprehensive approach to media impressed Ambit, which first came across the company five years ago but held off on investing while it assessed performance. The firm also liked PFT's willingness to create its own software instead of supporting others' creations.

"Traditionally, Indian IT investing has been services-focused, and very few companies have been able to come out with their own product," says Mangesh Pathak, a partner at Ambit. "This is a growth-stage company that is doing something unique in its own field. And it's not only unique in India, but globally also."

By 2016 PFT had moved past the early-stage risks and Ambit felt secure providing the company with its first round of external funding. It will help PFT grow its customer base through its leadership team's experience and industry connections. The company believes there is still room for expansion in India, but even more so overseas. PFT already supplies media giants such as Warner Brothers TV and Bloomberg, and it sees plenty of opportunities in specialized fields like sports. But new ventures will be chosen carefully to preserve gains.

"We are very disciplined in relation to going after growth where we see a definite revenue and cash flow path as opposed to a blue-sky opportunity," says PFT's Rathee. "As of now, we're very laser-focused on expanding the organic opportunity from a sales and marketing effort, because the product is really good."

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• Topics
• South Asia
• Media
• Technology
• Early-stage
• India
• Venture