BookMyShow.com is India's premiere online ticketing platform where consumers can search and book tickets for movies, plays, concerts, entertainment performances and sporting events. It partners with cinemas and event organizers to enable consumers to book tickets at the click of a mouse or on the go with BookMyShow's mobile applications. BookMyShow website draws more than 7 million visitors who book over 2 million tickets a month. Besides movie/play tickets, the company is an exclusive ticketing partner for several leading sporting franchises in India including Formula 1, Indian Premier League (5 of the 9 franchises), Aircel Chennai Open, Super Fight League, Yonex Badminton Championships, etc. The company has also expanded its footprint to international markets like Malaysia and New Zealand.
On signing the deal, Mr. Ashish Hemrajani, Founder & CEO of BookMyShow.com said, “The funding from Accel comes at an interesting inflection point in our journey and is a strong vindication of our efforts to create India’s largest online entertainment ticketing platform. We look forward to leveraging Accel’s global Internet experience and Network18’s continued support to expand our footprint and help take our customer experience to the next level.”
Accel Partners has been one of the earliest global investors in Internet businesses with successful investments in companies like Facebook, Groupon, Rovio (Angry Birds), etc. The firm has continued its track record in India by partnering early on with some of the leading Internet businesses including Flipkart and Myntra.
Mr. Prashanth Prakash, Partner of Accel India said, “BookMyShow.com caught our attention because it has become synonymous with online entertainment and ticketing. We are constantly striving to invest in businesses that assume a leadership position by driving the definition and growth of their respective categories. We are very excited to add one of India’s pre-eminent Internet brands to our portfolio of investments in India.”
Mr. Sameer Gandhi, Partner of Accel US further commented, “The Internet is playing a crucial role in bringing goods and services to the masses in India and will produce the next generation of Indian consumer franchises. BookMyShow .com has demonstrated exemplary execution in creating a large online community, and in our view, has the potential to become the pre-eminent entertainment destination for India. We look forward to playing our part in helping the company realize that vision.”
Network18, one of India’s leading media groups, has built an enviable investment portfolio of digital businesses. It partnered with the three founders of BookMyShow.com at the inception of the platform and has helped it establish its current leadership position.
Commenting on the transaction, Mr. Sarbvir Singh, Head Investments of Network18 said, “In partnership, with the BookMyShow.com team, we have created a premier asset in the digital commerce space and built value for all stakeholders. We believe that Accel’s global Internet experience combined with the passion of the
BookMyShow team will help the company take customer experience to the next level while continuing to build on its market leadership. The transaction has allowed us at Network18 to profitably monetize a part of our investment while allowing us to maintain a large position in the company to participate in the next phase of BookMyShow journey.”
Avendus Capital was the sole financial advisor to the transaction.
About BookMyShow.com:
Bigtree Entertainment's BookMyShow.com is the largest entertainment ticketing portal in India with over 90% market share in the online entertainment ticketing space. Headquartered in Mumbai, BookMyShow.com also has offices in New Zealand and Malaysia. BookMyShow.com has an enviable kitty of over 1300 screens spanning across 250 cinemas in more than 100 cities. BookMyShow.com tickets for over 500 events every year across India. In the arena of Sports, 75% of India's largest sporting events are managed by BookMyShow.com. Some of them include Formula 1, Indian Premier League, Indian Cricket League, Aircel Chennai Open, Super Fight League, Yonex Badminton Championships, etc. With over 33 million page views per month, BookMyShow.com has an active and loyal database of over 3million happy consumers. It has a fan following of over 1.3 million Facebook and Twitter users. BookMyShow.com has special downloadable mobile applications for Blackberry, iPhone, Android and Windows phone. It has also been awarded in the category of 'The Hottest Company of the Year-2011-12’ and ‘The Company to Watch Out for' in the prestigious CNBC Young Turks Award. On an average, BookMyShow.com sells more than a million tickets per month. BookMyShow.com is one of the top three entertainment e-commerce websites in India.
About Accel Partners: Founded in 1983, Accel Partners has a long history of partnering with outstanding entrepreneurs and management teams to build world-class businesses. Accel today invests globally using dedicated teams and market-specific strategies for local geographies, with offices in Palo Alto, California, New York City, London and Bangalore, as well as in China via its partnership with IDG-Accel. Accel has helped entrepreneurs build over 300 successful companies, many of which have defined their categories, including 99designs, Actuate, AdMob, Agile Software, Alfresco, Angry Birds (Rovio), Atlassian, BBN, Bonobos, Braintree, Brightcove, Cloudera, ComScore, Diapers.com (Quidsi), Dropbox, Etsy, Facebook, Fusion-IO, Gameforge, GlamMedia, Groupon, Imperva, Infinera, Interwoven, IronPlanet, JBoss, Kayak,Lookout, Macromedia, metroPCS, MoPub, OPOWER, Polycom/PictureTel, Playfish, Portal Software, QlikTech, Rapt, Real Networks, Redback, Responsys, Riverbed, Spotify, Squarespace, SunRun, Trulia, UUNet, Veritas, Walmart.com, Webroot, Wonga, XenSource and Zimbra. In India, Accel has made investments in companies such as Ace Creative Learning, Babyoye, EduPristine, enStage, Flipkart, Forus, FreshDesk, HealthcareMagic, Mitra Biotech, MuSigma, Myntra, Perfint, Probe, PropTiger, QwikCilver, SherSingh, SureWaves, Trivone, Vinculum and Virident. For more information, please visit the Accel Partners web site at www.accel.com find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/accel.
About Network 18: The Network18 Group is a media and entertainment company with interests in television, internet, films, ecommerce, magazines, mobile content and allied businesses. Through its subsidiary ‘TV18 Broadcast Ltd.’ [BSE: 532800, NSE: TV18BRDCST], the group operates news channels - CNBC-TV18, CNBC Awaaz, CNBC-TV18 Prime HD, CNN-IBN, IBN7 and IBN-Lokmat (a Marathi regional news channel in partnership with the Lokmat group). TV18 also operates a joint venture with Viacom, called Viacom18, which houses a portfolio of popular entertainment channels – Colors, Colors HD,MTV, SONIC, Comedy Central, VH1 and Nick - and Viacom18 Motion Pictures, the group’s filmed entertainment business. TV18 and Viacom18 have also recently announced a strategic joint venture called IndiaCast, a multi-platform ‘content asset monetization’ entity mandated to drive domestic and international channel distribution, placement services and content syndication for the bouquet of channels from TV18,Viacom18 and other broadcasters. TV18 has also forayed into the Indian factual entertainment space through A+E Networks
TV18 (Joint venture between A+E Networks and TV18 Broadcast), which has recently launched a new channel – HistoryTV18. Through ‘Network18 Media & Investments Ltd.’ [BSE: 532798, NSE: Network18], the group operates its digital, publishing and e-commerce assets including moneycontrol.com, ibnlive.com, in.com and firstpost.com. ‘Network18’ also operates e-commerce properties like HomeShop18 and bookmyshow.com and publishes Forbes India, the nation's first local edition of a foreign news magazine title and one of the world’s most influential business brands, in collaboration with Forbes Media. In addition, through ‘Network18’, the group operates Newswire18, providing real time financial information and news terminal services, and Network18 Publishing, a player in the special interest publishing space as well as E18, the group’s event management venture and Sport18, its sports management and marketing venture. ‘Network18’ has investments in Yatra, DEN Networks and other Capital18 portfolio companies. For more information, log on to www.network18online.com.
Sourced From: Perfect Relations PR
