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Vox Media, the media company whose properties include New York Magazine, announced the acquisition of Cafe Studios, the podcast company co-founded by Preet Bharara, former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Bharara — who inspired the character played by Paul Giamatti in Showtime’s “Billions” — was fired by then-President Trump in March 2017 as part of a purge of Obama-administration appointees.
Cafe Studios was founded in 2017 by Preet Bharara and his brother Vinit Bharara, a serial entrepreneur who previously founded Some Spider Studios and Diapers.com. Preet Bharara and Tamara Sepper, who serves as the executive producer and head of content at Cafe Studios, will join Vox Media along with a team of podcast hosts, producers, and product developers. Cafe Studios will operate as a division of the Vox Media Podcast Network.
Vox Media's brands are built on Concert, a marketplace for advertising, and Chorus, its proprietary content management system. The company's lines of business include the publishing platform Chorus, Concert, Vox Creative, Vox Entertainment, Vox Media Studios, and the Vox Media Podcast Network. Chicano Squad tells the true story of these men, their divided loyalties, and a city on the brink. Hosted by Cristela Alonzo. Produced by Frequency Machine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. This is certainly true for Vox Media, which over the past few years has launched over 150 podcasts on topics that include technology, politics, and sports. The audio medium is now an eight-figure.
Podcasts from Cafe Studios include its flagship “Stay Tuned With Preet,” exploring how law and policy intersect with politics, news, business, history and technology. Other podcast hosts include former New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram and Elie Honig, former co-head of the Southern District of New York’s organized crime unit. The company also operates a subscription program that offers members exclusive podcasts, newsletters, articles and live events.
Cafe Studios is Vox Media’s fourth merger or acquisition in the last three years. In its biggest deal, Vox Media in the fall of 2019 bought New York Media, publisher of New York Magazine and digital properties including the Cut and Vulture. The company also has acquired Epic, a film, TV, audio, and production studio, and commenting platform Coral.
“Preet and his team at Cafe have built a successful podcast studio with a compelling perspective — and an equally impressive community of devoted listeners,” Jim Bankoff, Vox Media’s chairman and CEO, said in a statement. “Bringing Cafe into the Vox Media Podcast Network is aligned with our goal of delivering high-quality editorial content at scale and providing audiences highly relevant voices and insights.”
Bharara said in a statement, “This is an opportunity for tremendous growth with a company that shares in Cafe’s mission, values, and commitment to quality. Our creators are bursting at the seams with plans for more thoughtful, educational content and, in Vox Media, we earn a partner with a large audience, strategic business, and a strong reach across text, video and events.”
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Last summer, Vox Media laid off 6% of its workforce, letting go about 70 employees, amid a steep revenue drop-off. The company expects be profitable in 2021 and still has cash on hand from $200 million in funding it raised in 2015 that valued the company at more than $1 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Vox Media’s podcast network includes more than 200 premium podcasts, “Today, Explained” with Sean Rameswaram, “Decoder” with Nilay Patel, and “Pivot,” co-hosted Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway.
The Vox Media Podcast Network (VMPN) announced today that it is expanding its partnership with journalist Kara Swisher and NYU professor Scott Galloway, doubling down on their award-winning business podcast Pivot and setting it up for continued expansion in 2021 at its home at VMPN and New York Magazine. VMPN will also be the new home for Galloway’s podcast The Prof G Show, which is joining the network from Westwood One.
With a new long term commitment to continue growing Pivot as a multi-platform franchise, plans this year include new forays into video; a further expansion into live events following the success of last year’s Pivot Schooled event, which attracted thousands of paying guests from 25 countries; and more. Galloway will continue to be a periodic voice on New York Magazine’s Intelligencer, where Pivot episodes also appear. Pivot’s audience, reaching today and tomorrow’s business leaders, is up about 50% in 2021 over 2020, following a year of strong growth when the show joinedNew York Magazine.
Given Pivot’s momentum as part of VMPN, and the network’s leadership in the business podcast category, Scott Galloway is bringing his The Prof G Showto the network. Effective April 1, VMPN will take over all sales, marketing, and distribution for the show, further growing the network’s audience base while unlocking new opportunities for advertisers. The Prof G Show launched in 2020 and covers business, technology, and entrepreneurship, featuring Galloway’s unique insights and advice, while hosting other professors, entrepreneurs, and journalists to help listeners navigate the innovation economy. Additionally, Prof G will move from weekly to twice-weekly, with episodes released on Mondays and Thursdays.
“We’re excited to bring more Pivot to listeners (plus viewers, readers, and event-goers) this year, as Scott and I help our audience make sense of new developments in tech, business, media and more, heading into the post-covid world,” says Swisher.
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“Kara and Vox Media have been great partners. I look forward to continued growth at Pivot and Prof G,” says Galloway.
Vox Media recently announced plans to bring Swisher’s Code conference back as an in-person event in September 2021 in Los Angeles.
About Pivot
Every Tuesday and Friday, technology journalist Kara Swisher and NYU Professor Scott Galloway offer sharp, unfiltered insights into the biggest stories in tech, business, and politics. They make bold predictions, pick winners and losers, and bicker and banter like no other. After all, with great power comes great scrutiny. Pivot won the 2021 iHeart Podcast Award for Best Business and Finance Podcast, the 2020 Webby award for Best Business Podcast, and was named Thought Leadership Podcast of the Year by Adweek in 2019. From New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network.
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About The Prof G Show
In a winner-take-all system, there are those within the innovation economy and those who aren’t. Each week on The Prof G Show, best-selling author and NYU professor Scott Galloway offers a no mercy, no malice take on how listeners can level up their game in the world of business. Beginning in April, Prof G will release episodes on Mondays and Thursdays.
About Vox Media Podcast Network
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Named by Adweek as 2020’s “Podcast Network of the Year,” Vox Media Podcast Network has over 200 active shows featuring industry-leading editorial voices and storytellers from Vox Media’s networks and beyond. From daily news and tech, to culture and sports, and from talk and interview shows to news and rich narrative storytelling, the Vox Media Podcast Network is one of the largest, fastest-growing, and most topically-diverse collections of premium podcasts. Learn more about the Vox Media Podcast Network here.