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After five acquisitions in 2021, Vox Media has dubbed itself the "most acquisitive company" in digital media, chief revenue officer Ryan Pauley told Kerry in an AdWeek panel yesterday.

Why it matters: Vox Media has been working to integrate these new brands within the larger umbrella, but Pauley suggested that the company is always hunting for new acquisitions, despite a quiet 2022.

What they're saying: Vox Media is "really aggressive when the opportunities present themselves," Pauley told the panel. 

"We are always very active and have a lot of practice on integrating and making sure we can get the most out of, and use the platform that we've built to capitalize on what those opportunities are," he says.

"We think there's a lot of amazing brands out there that can and should have homes, but we're focused on the execution at hand," he says.

"What we know for sure is through a challenging market, companies that stay really disciplined with strong execution can and will emerge stronger on the other side," he says.

Catch up quick: In December 2021, Vox Media announced its acquisition of Group Nine.

Earlier that year, Vox Media acquired cocktail media brand Punch, podcast companies Criminal Productions and Cafe Studios, and podcast news brand Hot Pod. 

The intrigue: Pauley says a good acquisition for Vox Media could be a media brand covering a specific area it isn't already embedded in, such as gaining pet vertical through The Dodo or the women's lifestyle category with PopSugar.

It also could be a company with "strategic capabilities," he says, like The Strategic's e-commerce business and New York Magazine's digital subscription business. 

What's next: When asked about going public like BuzzFeed or pursuing another exit, Pauley says Vox Media doesn't "have any plans to talk about going public."

"We just don't spend too much time thinking about what the macro environment needs to be for different outcomes," Pauley says. "What we spend all of our time focused on is building a great company with great culture, [that] produces amazing product, builds a great business."

1 big thing: Vox Media CRO on M&A

Photo illustration of Ryan Pauley with geometric shapes.

Photo illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios. Photo: James Bareham/Vox Media

Spindl, a Miami-based startup that wants to bring attribution measurement to web3, raised $7 million in funding led by crypto VCs Ani Pai of Dragonfly and Jeff Morris Jr. of Chapter One.

Why it's the BFD: Attribution is one of the key pillars of e-commerce on the modern web, but the decentralized nature of web3 makes finding where your customers are coming from significantly more complex, Tim writes.

For NFT sellers like OpenSea or Rarible, they know who buys an NFT off their platform and where it's going. But they may not know how that buyer found them in the first place.

"There's a wall between Web2 and Web3," the company's CEO Antonio García Martínez told Coin Desk. 

How it works: Spindl combs through Discord posts, Reddit forums, ad impressions and other click-through links and combines that with purchase behaviors like buying, selling and trading. 

"Correct attribution in Web3 isn't some horrible intrusion of skeumorphic Web 2 machinery, it's a way to correctly credit a digital asset (and ultimately its owner) with the revenue they produced, in whatever downstream form," García Martínez said in a post on Spindl's website. "Without it, the NFT market will struggle to be more than a speculative art market mimicking the real-world one."

Details: Additional investment in the round came from Multicoin Capital; Polygon Ventures; Solana Ventures; Tribe Capital; FJ Labs; Founders, Inc.; Heracles Capital; and HodlCo. 

Angel investors Balaji Srinivasan, Anthony Pompliano, Dan Romero and Ryan Selkis also participated.

2. The BFD: Attribution for web3

Illustration of a collage of circles made of money forming a decentralized web.

Los Angeles Clippers owner Steve Ballmer is America's richest sports owner for the eighth consecutive year, according to Forbes, Axios Sports' Jeff Tracy writes.

Why it matters: It's not just that Ballmer tops the list; it's by how much.

The former Microsoft CEO is worth more than four times as much as the next-richest NBA owner, and 37% more than any other owner across the Big Four sports leagues.

The big picture: More than 10% of Forbes 400 members own a sports team. But even among those ultra-wealthy owners, Ballmer is in a league of his own.

3. Charted: Ballmer's billions

AT&T (NYSE: T) hired Morgan Stanley to find an infrastructure investor to partner on a fiber network buildout that could be valued at between $10b and $15b, per Bloomberg. https://axios.link/3CRpxUm

Stagwell (NASDAQ: STGW) acquired Epicenter Experience, a Boston-based enterprise software company with a location-based consumer behavior platform. https://axios.link/3TycyOb

The Ratkovich Company, the LA-based real estate developer, and a J.P. Morgan Global Alternatives investment group acquired a three-acre property near Downtown Culver City to develop it into a creative campus, per Variety. https://axios.link/3VyKkES

Spotify and FanDuel agreed to a multi-year deal that will see FanDuel expand its partnership with The Ringer, Axios Sports' Kendall Baker reports. https://axios.link/3TDvvz0

Lionel Messi launched Play Time, an SF-based investment firm focused on sports, media and tech. The soccer star's investment vehicle will be run by Graph Ventures' Razmig Hovaghimian. https://axios.link/3eM4omJ

4. Deal flow

Park Pictures hired Cody Ryder as executive producer of commercials, co-head of film and TV. She previously worked at Plum Productions. https://axios.link/3samvWq

Le Train Train Productions, owned by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack, named Nicole Emanuele a partner. She was a founding member of the YouTube Originals team. https://axios.link/3VHkluT

Walter Hamada has officially left Warner Bros. Discovery as president of DC films, per Deadline. https://axios.link/3ySZECy

Leo Olebe, games partnerships executive at Google, is moving over to YouTube to lead its gaming division. He replaces Ryan Wyatt, who left in February. https://axios.link/3VFB0z6

Amin Zoufonoun is stepping down as Meta's VP of corporate development, after a 12-year run that included work on the acquisitions of Instagram, Oculus and WhatsApp. https://axios.link/3ThSVdL 

5. Movin' on up (or out)

Activist group asks Justice Dept. to unwind Live Nation and Ticketmaster merger (Billboard)

"Ticketmaster's market power over live events is ripping off sports and music fans and undermining the vibrancy and independence of the music industry," said Sarah Miller, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project. 

Too much volume? The tech behind 'Mandalorian' and 'House of the Dragon' faces growing pains (THR)

"It was a big learning curve, and I think it worked really well for some moments and less well for others," HBO's "House of the Dragon" director Clare Kilner told Carolyn Giardina.

The great Netflix debate: Do its movies belong in theaters? (WSJ)

"Some 52% of consumers now prefer to watch films at home, according to a report by market-research firm National Research Group, which interviewed more than 11,000 people across nine countries in August," Robbie Whelan and Sarah Krouse write. 

6. Channel surfing

Illustration of a TV color test screen in the shape of a wave.

🗓️ Situational awareness: AT&T reported earnings this morning. Snap reports after the bell.

🍺 🍷 Meet us IRL! Axios Pro is holding a subscriber-exclusive happy hour next Tuesday night in NYC. Space is limited! RSVP now.

@tim_bays: "Alaska Daily" on ABC. Another show my wife tells me we need to start watching.

@kerrymflynn: "Black Adam" at AMC Theatres. So, the reviews are bad. But I'll watch any superhero movie, especially when there's The Rock.

✏️ Thanks to George Moriarty for editing and Katie Lewis for copy editing this newsletter.

Thank you for reading Axios Pro Media Deals! Please ask your friends, colleagues and Steve Ballmer to sign up.

October 20, 2022

1 big thing: Vox Media CRO on M&A