Alloy Digital acquires entertainment news provider Clevver Media
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Alloy Digital has acquired Clevver Media, the entertainment news provider behind the young-Hollywood-focused ClevverTV channel, styled as a teen verson of TMZ and available on YouTube.
Clevver Media operates seven entertainment and celebrity-focused YouTube channels, including ClevverMovies, ClevverGames and ClevverStyle. ClevverTV is the most popular, attracting more than 460,000 subscribers -- and nearly 1 billion cumulative video views -- with celebrity interviews and red carpet coverage of such films as “The Hunger Games.” It’s ranked among the top 20 YouTube partner channels by measurement firm ComScore.
Clevver Media has “very popular content with our demographic. ... It’s a franchise that constantly draws a lot of people to it,” said Alloy Digital’s chief executive, Matt Diamond.
The transaction, for a reported $5 million to $10 million, marks the third by Alloy Digital over the last year, as it aggressively pursues online viewers in the coveted 12-to-34 demographic. Alloy earlier purchased Smosh, the YouTube humor channel created by the web-based comedy duo of Ian Hecox and Anthony Padilla; the digital studio Generate, which is headed by former WB Network chief executive Jordan Levin; and women’s lifestyle publisher B5 Media.
Diamond said Alloy has been building a digital media company that attracts sizeable audiences, in hopes of using YouTube channels with established followings to launching new online series. For example, it introduced a new web original animated show, “Shut Up Cartoons,” on Smosh.
“Clevver has their YouTube originals that were launched from ClevverTV,” Diamond said. “It’s no different than ‘All in the Family’ launching ‘The Jeffersons,’ or ‘Cheers’ launching ‘Frasier.’”
Strauss Zelnik’s ZelnickMedia led an investor group that acquired Alloy Digital parent Alloy Inc. in 2010. Alloy Inc. last week sold Alloy Entertainment, a division that specializes in young adult books, to Warner Bros. Television Group at a price that exceeded $100 million.
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