Shekhar Gupta, the editor who turned entrepreneur, received an investment of INR 3.49 Cr for his digital media platform, The Print, from existing investors Ratan Naval Tata in what seems to be an extended seed round.
The parent company, Printline Media Private Limited prearranged 343 Seed debentures each worth INR 102,000 on March 12, 2018.
Since its foundation, the parent company raised funds worth INR 45 Cr over 2016-17 and Ratan Tata personally invested about INR 4.99 Cr, which includes the most recent one.
The company founded by Shekhar Gupta has seen several investments from marquee venture capitalists such as N.R Narayana Murthy, Nandan Nilekani, Uday Kotak Family, Kiran Mazumdar Shaw (Biocon Ltd founder), Rajiv C. Mody (Bangalore-based tech-entrepreneur), Vijay Shekhar (founder of Paytm) and Ravi Thakran (Chairman of LVMH Asia) among others. The money funded was used to launch the website The Print.
The Print ventured in a crowded digital new market where independent players are going toe-to-toe with media giants such as The Times of India, Hindustan Times and Indian Express.
Experts from the media industry believe that digital advertising will grow significantly in the next few years. Several reports concerning digital media platforms indicate healthy growth from digital advertising coming into 2020. Dentsu Aegis Network reports that revenues from digital advertising will touch 24% of total advertising until the end of 2020. The industry of digital advertising on its part is predicted to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 37% to reach INR 23,7595 crore by 2020.
ThePrint.in is a digital news website launched in August 2017 by Shekhar Gupta and covers news, analysis, opinion and knowledge venture. They focus particularly on politics and policy, government and governance. The New Delhi-based company aims at building a network across India by investing in high-quality investigative and questioning journalism.