Music Feeds parent Evolve acquires video ad network VOLT

PRESS RELEASE:

Evolve Media, a global integrated digital media company focused on enthusiast publishing, marketing services and video solutions, continues to expand its footprint in Australia and New Zealand with a number of new acquisitions, as well as a major website launch.

Co-Founder and President of Evolve Media, Brian Fitzgerald, touched down in Australia to show the firm’s growing commitment to strengthening their already healthy portfolio of digital properties.

“When my partner and I co-founded Evolve in 2000, we employed a handful of people and worked from our homes. Now, our staff has grown to more than 400 people, in 22 offices, across 7 countries,” said Fitzgerald. “In Australia, Evolve has made enormous progress since opening in 2009, by expanding operations across Sydney, Melbourne and Perth, while operating over 50 digital properties, and drawing an Unique Audience of 5.34m* and over 171m* pv . Gorilla Nation now reaches a unique audience of 3.8m* and Totally Her 3.1m* in Australia (Nielsen Answers September 15)

As part of the company’s growth strategy, Evolve has acquired VOLT, one of Australia’s largest independent premium video and technology companies that can reach audiences by delivering a variety of interactive video formats to multiple screens from Internet connected TV’s to mobile devices and computer monitors. Evolve also acquired Urban Geek, a leading exclusive online publisher that offers premium Australian audiences across 4 key categories including entertainment, sports, gaming, and technology.

Additionally, the company is launching Mumtastic, a local version of the hugely successful U.S. parenting site Momtastic, an all-inclusive web destination combining premium content and community for today’s mothers. Not only does Mumtastic cover parenting and pregnancy, the site also serves women’s other passion points with content on style and beauty advice, recipes, DIY projects, relationship secrets, celeb gossip, and more.

“I’m proud to say that these developments will allow Evolve to become a more competitive media company in the Australian market,” stated Mr. Fitzgerald. “Our long term goal is to makeEvolve Media one of the premier destinations for male and women’s lifestyle, entertainment and video content in Australia and a marquee partner to brands in the digital advertising market here,” said Fitzgerald.

The announcements build upon the recent Australian localization of some of the company’s biggest owned and operated international brands such as premier fashion site theFashionSpot and youth culture site CraveOnline.

Evolve Media Managing Director in Australia James Perry said the combined strength that the announcements make to our male and female lifestyle divisions is unparalleled.

“This allows us to also drive integrated sales across highly targeted and focused environments like Crave Online, Music Feeds, Wikia, Rotten Tomatoes, Funny or Die, College Humor and Daily Motion. These deals mark another milestone for us as we establish increasingly larger local publishing offerings and further invest in local editorial and coverage,” said Perry.

“We are passionate about our ability to reach a broad male and female demographic both at scale and while in highly targeted and niche environments. With these acquisitions and partnerships, we now have an even richer platform to allow marketers and content creators to interact with audiences in a very custom and unique way.”