Scoop: Exeest closes seed round, eyes streaming market

Content marketplace startup Exeest has raised $3.1 million in a seed funding round, the company exclusively told Axios.

Why it matters: Exeest intends to create a digital marketplace where TV and film buyers and sellers can connect, screen and negotiate content deals. 

• The proliferation of streaming services, coupled with the runaway global success of international hits like Netflix's "Squid Game," has only furthered the need for those services to have as much content as possible.
• Exeest argues that the current method of buying and selling content takes too long and needs to be streamlined.
• The company, led by CEO Matteo Petrelli, launched early last year. Clients include Legendary, Bron, Propagate and Vice.

Details: The funding will go toward building out the transactional part of the business, Petrelli tells Axios.

• To date, Exeest has primarily connected buyers and sellers.
• The next step, Petrelli explains, is for them to be able to make deals on the platform itself. "We created the discovery platform, and now we're moving into transactional."
• Investors in the seed round include former Condé Nast CEO Bob Sauerberg, former NBCUniversal Television chairman Jeff Gaspin and Candle Media CFO Salil Mehta. 

By the numbers: Independent studios and filmmakers account for more than 65% of global spend on high-end content, says Petrelli. The amount of people subscribed to a streaming service is expected to top 1.5 billion by 2025.

The big picture: The streaming era has shattered the foreign-language barrier, but finding the next "Squid Game" is currently an onerous process.

• "Now there's a need for Korean dramas from other streamers and platforms, not just in the U.S., but around the world," John Pollak, chief commercial officer, says. "It might take days, weeks, months, or never, to find that content."

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