Amazon In Talks To Buy Indian Video Giant MX Player

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Amazon is engaging with Times Internet to explore the acquisition of MX Player, one of the largest on-demand video streaming services in India, according to four sources familiar with the matter, as the American e-commerce group eyes expanding its entertainment ambitions in the key overseas market. The deliberations are remarkable for MX Player, which was acquired by the Indian conglomerate Times Internet for $140 million in 2018. The video app, popular for supporting a wide range of video formats and reliability on low-cost Android smartphones, has expanded to original content in recent years and has amassed more than 300 million users globally. MX Player has gained wide adoption in markets such as India in part by offering its wide video catalog that includes access to live cable TV channels at no charge to consumers. Instead the service makes most of its revenue through ads. MX Player was one of the earliest video apps to expand into short-video format, cashing in on an opportunity created in the aftermath of New Delhi banning TikTok in the country in mid-2020. MX Player eventually merged that business with ShareChat's short-video offering Moj in a deal worth $900 million. [...] MX Player, which offers its premium offerings in many international markets, claims it has over 150 million active users in India. The firm last raised a venture round in 2019, when it received an investment of $110.8 million in a funding round led by Tencent. That round valued MX Player at $500 million.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.