Amazon Starts Due Diligence To Buy MX Player For About INR 900 Cr

Ecommerce giant Amazon reportedly has appointed one of the Big Four accounting firms to perform the due diligence procedure to buy MX Player. The process might take 30-40 days to get completed, sources told Mint.

We earlier reported that Amazon was in advanced discussions with Times Internet to acquire its video streaming platform MX Player.

After the due diligence report, if everything goes well, Amazon would acquire MX Player for about INR 600-INR 900 Cr in the next two months. 

“Earlier, Times Internet was asking for over $100 Mn for MX Player, while Amazon’s internal team valued it at around INR 500 Cr ($60 Mn). The deal is likely to be in the range of INR 600-900 Cr,” a source told the publication.

It is prudent to note here that the acquisition of MX Player will strengthen Amazon’s play in the AVoD  (advertiser video-on-demand) space. A month ago, media giant Zee-Sony also showed interest in acquiring MX Player, however talks fell through. 

Currently, the ecommerce giant is operating a subscription-based streaming platform Prime Video and an advertisement-supported MiniTV service in India. Prime Video offers video streaming services, ad-free music and free shipping of selected items to Indian users.

On the other hand, MiniTV, which is not a subscription-based platform, predominantly targets smartphone and internet users.

Talking about MX Player, it was earlier developed by Karan Bedi in 2011 as a video player. In 2018, it was bought by Times Internet for about $140 Mn and eventually, remodeled it to an ad-supported video streaming platform. In 2019, it raised $110 Mn funding from Tencent, which was considered one of the largest fundraising rounds of that time.

At present, MX Player claims to have more than 300 Mn users across the globe. 

One of the primary reasons for selling off MX Player is that its parent company, Times Internet, is facing a cash crunch to support its expansion plans. Due to this, the company has been selling off its business verticals for some time now. 

Last year, Times Internet sold off five verticals–MX Takatak, Dineout, MensXP, iDiva and Hypp. 

Currently, players such as Disney+Hotstar and Netflix are leading India’s OTT space. While in the entertainment arena, MX Player faces competition from Google’s YouTube, JoshTalks and other short-video apps.  

As per a Statista report, the country’s OTT video segment is anticipated to garner a revenue of $3.76 Bn in 2023 and secure a market volume of $5.51 Bn by 2027.

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Update|22nd March 2023, 7.32 PM

Details about MX Player has been updated in the story