Renowned Silicon Valley veteran Tim Draper has invested an undisclosed amount in TNL Media Group, an independent multi-language media and data platform in Taiwan.
Draper invested through his fund Draper Associates VI.
TNL Media is the VC fund’s first direct investment in Taiwan. It comes a year after it closed a financing round with notable international investors, including New York-based VC firm Palm Drive and Guitar Hero and XRM Media co-founder Kai Huang.
The group will use the money to grow its media presence, offer new verticals throughout Asia, and invest in its data analytic capabilities. It also aims to unify the data across all media brands and create synergies across content, adtech and data analytics products.
Additionally, TNL Media announced the launch of its seventh media brand, Ohsowow, which will mainly focus on Korean entertainment, culture, and lifestyle content. Ohsowow aims to be the go-to media platform within the international Chinese-language market for Korean entertainment and lifestyle reporting.
Also Read: YouTube, Twitch co-founders invest in Taiwanese news site The News Lens
TNL Media provides media, digital advertising, and data analytics platforms for the Asian market. It was launched in Mandarin and English to provide inclusive, in-depth, diverse, and highly influential content for digital readers. The group has since expanded and acquired a mobile ad network, big data research company, and launched a data analytics platform.
As a result, the group can effectively grasp user information through zero-party, first-party, third-party databases, AI analysis, Martech, and other cross-domain core products.
The group consists of seven content brands and ten subsidiaries, with over 230 staff members in Taipei, Hong Kong, and Japan. Its other media brands are The News Lens, INSIDE, Sports Vision, Cool3c, Agent Movie, every little d.
TNL now has a staff of over 230 and plans to continue expanding its readership size, international presence, strategic data partnerships and new technological capabilities.
Other high-profile investors include North Base Media, an original seed investor in The News Lens, YouTube co-founder Steve Chen, and Twitch co-founder Kevin Lin.
TNL Media will also continue to invest in bolstering its holistic data ecosystem — ranging from our zero party data products via (permission-based, PDPA compliant) mobile passive tracking panel – Engagement Lab, research panel – ShareParty, first-party data from TNLs’ media brands, and integration with second and third-party data via MarTech/AI.
“With China’s President abandoning the free markets and business, we are seeing an influx of great entrepreneurs to Taiwan and other parts of Southeast Asia,” said Draper, who has earlier invested in Skype, Tesla and SpaceX.
“An honest, fair media site, combined with data analytics and artificial intelligence, could be the next development in media. Additionally, the demographics of the 18 million monthly uniques in TNL Media is the sweet spot for early-stage entrepreneurs. We expect TNL to grow rapidly,” he added.
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