For a startup that all started with just two nerds sharing photos between their PlayStations and no business plan, Flipps has become quite the success story. The Bulgarian startup which now has offices in Sofia, San Francisco and New York, has recently received 2,4 million dollars from existing seed investors, including Silicon Valley venture capitalist-superstar Tim Draper and Sofia-based seed fund LAUNCHub. New onboard the venture is Berlin-based Earlybird Venture Capital, which invested from its new Digital East Fund that supports disruptive consumer Internet, mobile, and enterprise technology companies originating from Turkey and CEE. The financial boost brings Flipps’ total funding to 2,85 million dollars, according to the company.
Kosta Jordanov, CEO of Flipps, told inventures.eu the team is thankful to have the full support of their existing investors once again and is thrilled with the opportunity to work with the Earlybird team. “We’re committed more than ever to deliver to our vision to make TV time a richer and more rewarding experience,” he said.
With this additional investment, Jordanov said the company will continue to expand its content partnerships and to evolve the Flipps product by fusing what people love about TV and mobile to deliver a unique user experience.
Disrupting mobile-to-TV entertainment
Flipps is a cloud-based mobile app operated by patented technology enabling content-sharing and seamless integration across a range of platforms and devices – TVs, game consoles, Blu-ray players, audio systems and media boxes. The app also allows for HD video delivery in 3D optimised in real time, and delivery of on-demand video content to any TV set without additional hardware.
Despite not doing much marketing, the app has recently topped ten million downloads, and claims to be the second most popular TV streaming service next to Apple TV. “We’re super lucky to have a great and active user community and our growth so far has been mostly driven by word of mouth,” Jordanov said.
According to the Council for Research Excellence, TV is still the primary viewing platform with 84% of viewing hours, and Nielsen states that searching for and viewing online entertainment on a mobile device continues to accelerate rapidly with the latest year-over-year increase of 37 percent. Those figures could also explain the steady growth of Flipps user base.
Creating a scalable new TV distribution platform
Beyond a simple streaming tool for individuals, Flipps is also a distribution channel that allows selected publishers to expand reach over 250 million TVs worldwide. Although Flipps has already amassed over a hundred channels in its library of licensed content, Jordanov said that the company’s immediate focus is on increasing the variety of the offering. “We’re in active discussions with some of the biggest and most forward-looking publishers, and we’re excited with the opportunity to partner with them to bring on TV content beyond what’s currently available on cable,” he said.
Read more our previous coverage of Flipps here and there.
Photo credit: bitmovin GmbH
