PlayBuzz, a new company from the son of Israel’s former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Shaul, which offers users a platform for online content engagement and social distribution, has raised $16 million in Series B financing. The round was led by venture capital fund 83North, with additional investment from Saban Capital and participation of existing investors Carmel Ventures and FirstTime Ventures.
The company said that it will use the new infusion of capital to expand its global operations, enrich the variety of formats available on the platform and empower online publishers with extended authoring, distribution and monetization capabilities.
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PlayBuzz is also opening offices in Asia and Europe, in addition to its current offices in New York.
Comparable to BuzzFeed, PlayBuzz asserts that by using its free authoring platform at playbuzz.com/create, every web site editor or contributor may author a new item on their topic of choice. After completing the authoring process, they may embed the newly created item on your website, using a JavaScript embed code or a WordPress plugin.
“The immense popularity of social media has disrupted the digital publishing industry”, said Shaul Olmert, PlayBuzz Founder & CEO. “PlayBuzz’s free platform enables content owners to rely on its proven, ready-made content formats, and deliver content items that are ideal for their target audience, for cross platform adaptability and for social sharing.”
“PlayBuzz’s dramatic growth and fast adoption points to the market’s thirst for a scalable platform to create viral audience engagement” said Arnon Dinur, Partner at 83North, who has joined PlayBuzz’s board of directors following the investment. “We are thrilled to invest in this category leader, whose meteoric rise in popularity has made it the destination of choice for publishers seeking to engage today’s always-connected, always-evolving digital audiences.”
