Brands
Viacom18 awards media mandate to Madison Media
MUMBAI: Madison Media has been appointed as the agency-on-record for Viacom18 and will now handle the media planning and buying duties for its entire gamut of brands. It won the account after a multi-agency pitch.
Viacom18 Group CEO Sudhanshu Vats says, “We have constantly endeavored to build a portfolio of iconic, distinctive brands and leverage synergies wherever possible. As we step into our next decade, the consolidation of our media duties under one agency will allow us to drive economies of scale and dial up synergies within the network. In Madison, we found a passionate, confident and committed partner with a varied body of work that cuts across industries.”
Madison group CEO of media and OOH Vikram Sakhuja adds, “It is particularly exciting to be chosen as Viacom18’s consolidated media AOR at a point in time when it has successfully celebrated its first decade and is poised to develop segmented offerings for 1.3 billion Indians. Viacom18 is the country’s foremost storyteller with leading brands in almost every broadcast genre it operates in. Add to that the allied businesses the network has invested in–merchandising and live events and for an agency nothing can be headier and more dynamic than being a partner in the marketing of such varied content.”
Madison Media has been in the news recently for winning key accounts of Titan, Sri Sri Tatva and Xiaomi in Bangalore, Uber in Delhi and Bandhan Bank in Kolkata, apart from winning a host of other accounts across its office in the country.
Viacom18 recently celebrated its 10th anniversary.
Brands
UK’s OnlyFans seeks US investor at $3bn valuation after owner’s death
The adult video platform is seeking stability after the death of its billionaire owner
LONDON: OnlyFans is looking for a new partner. The London-based adult video platform is in advanced talks to sell a minority stake of less than 20 per cent to Architect Capital, a San Francisco-based investment firm, in a deal that would value the business at more than $3bn (£2.2bn).
The move is driven by an urgent need for stability. Leonid Radvinsky, the Ukrainian-American billionaire who owned OnlyFans, died of cancer last month at the age of 43, leaving the future of one of Britain’s most profitable privately held businesses suddenly uncertain.
The choice of Architect Capital is not arbitrary. The firm has deep expertise in financial services, which aligns neatly with OnlyFans’ ambitions to offer banking products to its creators, many of whom have long struggled to access basic financial services because of the nature of their work.
The numbers behind OnlyFans are, by any measure, staggering. The platform posted revenues of $1.4bn in the year to 30th November 2024, with a pre-tax profit of $684m, up four per cent on the prior year. Payments to creators totalled $7.2bn over the same period, a rise of nearly ten per cent. Radvinsky personally collected $701m in dividends from the business in 2024 alone, on top of more than $1bn in such payments he had already received. The platform, run through its parent company Felix International, hosts 4.6m creator accounts, with performers keeping 80 per cent of subscription proceeds and the platform pocketing the remaining 20 per cent. It has 377m fan accounts in total.
The current minority stake talks represent a notable scaling back of ambitions. In January, OnlyFans was reported to be in discussions with Architect about selling a majority stake of 60 per cent. Before that, the company had explored a sale to a consortium led by Forest Road Company, a Los Angeles-based investment firm. Neither deal materialised.
OnlyFans has built an enormously lucrative business on content that mainstream finance has long refused to touch. Now, with its owner gone and a $3bn valuation on the table, it is looking for the kind of respectable institutional backing that might finally persuade the banks to take its calls.
