Spin Master – the powerhouse behind award-winning brands PAW Patrol, Bakugan, Kinetic Sand, Air Hogs and more – announced today the creation of Spin Master Ventures (SMV). SMV’s focus will be to accelerate growth in each of the company’s three creative centres comprising Toys, Entertainment and Digital Games, through strategic minority investments. SMV’s investment mandate will be centred on medium- and long-term trends including emerging technologies, pioneering services and other areas where Spin Master’s offering can be strengthened.
“We’ve always stayed true to our entrepreneurial DNA based on innovation, openness to ideas, partnerships and pushing boundaries,” says Ronnen Harary, Spin Master’s Co-Founder and Board Chair. “The pace of innovation within the toy, entertainment and digital games industries is accelerating rapidly and by investing with a long-term view in leading ventures with promising ideas, we can increase our access to potentially game-changing thinking and concepts. Spin Master Ventures will establish us as the partner of choice for entrepreneurs looking for capital to start and grow a business in the kids’ space and will complement our acquisition strategy as well as bolster our product development pipeline.”
Spin Master will initially allocate $100 million to SMV – which will be led by experienced industry veterans – funded from existing internal resources. SMV’s strategy will comprise minority investments and will include both early-stage companies, with investments in new teams and novel ideas, as well as providing growth capital to emerging businesses that have proven product and market fit. SMV’s geographic focus will be global but will be North American and Europe-centric initially.
To launch the initiative, SMV has made minority investments in two companies aligned with Spin Master’s growth plans within the Digital Games creative centre. Nørdlight, a mobile game development company based in Stockholm is comprised of a five-person team with over 50 years of experience in the mobile games industry. Nørdlight’s team have delivered some of the highest-grossing mobile digital games in history, with past projects including the running of the prototype team at King.com and leading the technology and art for digital games titles including Candy Crush Saga. Nørdlight will help accelerate Spin Master’s strategy of monetising its owned IP in the digital games space.
The second investment is in Hoot Reading, an online tutoring service that provides children with live 1:1 reading lessons with experienced teachers. The research-based service connects kids with real classroom teachers to advance their reading skills through a video chat platform that allows for real-time on-screen collaboration between the child and teacher. The company is headquartered in Canada and has teachers and students throughout North America. Using personalised and engaging lessons and a carefully curated library of more than 2,000 high-quality texts, Hoot Reading aims to help as many kids as possible to become not only proficient, but excellent readers.
“Establishing Spin Master Ventures enables Spin Master to work with extraordinary companies and teams, providing them with capital and access to our deep knowledge and expertise to drive their ideas and businesses forward,” commented Anton Rabie, Spin Master’s Co-Founder and Director. “Spin Master Ventures aims to become the ultimate partnership generator, a tool for widening Spin Master’s networks, knowledge and relationships. By partnering with these entrepreneurs, we can bolster our leadership position within the children’s entertainment industry.”