NEW YORK (Reuters) – Live sports streaming service FloSports said on Monday that it raised $47 million from investors including current partner Discovery Inc. to grow its coverage of new and existing sports.
Other current investors that participated included Causeway Media Partners LP, Fertitta Capital and DCM Ventures. Strategic investors included World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. and Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments, a unit of Bertelsmann SE & Co KGaA.
FloSports launched in 2009 to concentrate on marginalized sports that were not covered regularly or deeply in traditional media, particularly track and field and wrestling.
It tapped into fans’ passion for the sports they played and expanded to cover more than 20 sports, including soccer, basketball, volleyball, rodeo, bowling, softball, cycling, cheerleading, weightlifting and ballroom dance.
With the new round of funding, “we will further enrich underserved sports communities by broadening our existing coverage and expanding into new verticals,” said FloSports CEO and co-founder Mark Floreani in a statement.
Last year the firm inked or extended at least 250 media rights deals, boosting the number of games available to watch in some underserved sports and creating content about key matches and star athletes.
Last month the Colonial Athletic Association signed a four-year, seven-figure partnership for FloSports to cover the league’s 22 sports, the first time any collegiate conference selected a direct-to-consumer streaming service as its primary media partner.
FloSports’ subscriber numbers and annual recurring revenue have both grown by more than 50 percent year over year.
Net subscriber growth through the first quarter of 2019 was greater than all subscriber growth in 2018, the company said.
Editing by Sonya Hepinstall