Asia-based streaming firm Iflix has completed its latest funding round by bringing in major institutional investor Fidelity. The company says it is now looking towards an IPO.
Iflix, which has operations across 12 Asian countries, said that the funding cycle brought in “well in excess of $50 million,” but provided few new details. Other participants in the round have previously been announced as including Korea’s JTBC, Japan’s Yoshimoto Kogyo and Indonesia’s MNC. They are in addition to the continued investment by founder Catcha Group and strategic shareholders Hearst, Sky and EMC, “each of whom also participated in the round.”
In the past year, the company has introduced a free tier and accelerated involvement in local content production. It reported that its active user base at the end of May was 16 million, up from 9 million six months earlier.
Iflix is currently available in Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Brunei, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Myanmar, Vietnam, Cambodia, Nepal and Bangladesh.
“We are incredibly proud to have Fidelity International cornerstone this latest round of funding, along with investments from all our major shareholders and some of the region’s most significant media companies,” said Iflix chairman and co-founder Patrick Grove in a statement. “These investments are a clear affirmation of Iflix’s business model and growth prospects, and strengthens our ties to some of the region’s largest providers of local content.”