Dive Brief:
- NBCUniversal made a $500 million investment in Snap Inc. at the Snapchat parent company's IPO last week as reported by Reuters.
- Snap isn’t NBCU’s only digital media investment. Over the last year and half it has also put $400 million in Buzzfeed and $200 million in Vox Media.
- "This is a significant milestone in our growing partnership with Snap, and we look forward to participating in Snap's success as an investor and continuing to work closely with them for years to come," wrote NBCU CEO Steve Burke in a memo sent to employees.
Dive Insight:
NBCUniversal is among a number of media companies that have been active in sharing content on Snapchat as well as helping the social media app with its stated goal of adding more TV-like content to its platform. Last August, NBCU announced shortened versions of some of it TV shows including “The Voice” and E! News’ “The Rundown,” along with original content from “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” and “Saturday Night Live.” Last month Snapchat ran the first original scripted short from Saturday Night Live.
Burke’s memo about the Snap investment indicated that the media giant expects to add more shows to its Snapchat content in the near future. NBCU is the only U.S. media company with an investment in Snap and it was reported by CNBC that NBCU has agreed to hold its shares for at least one year. Snap likely made the request to help stabilize its stock value as it focuses on building the platform.
Snap's burgeoning TV content strategy coincides with similar moves by Facebook, Google and others, suggesting the next couple of years could see a significant redrawing of the TV landscape. Last week, Google launched YouTube TV with a $35 package. Among other efforts, Facebook recently launched app for Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV and Samsung Smart TV, which enables users to view videos shared by friends or Pages they follow, top live videos and recommended videos.
