BookMyShow Acquires Majority Stake In Media & Entertainment Startup TribeVibe

Online ticketing platform BookMyShow has acquired a majority stake in TribeVibe, which provides a one-stop solution for college events, for an undisclosed amount. 

The partnership will enable BookMyShow (BMS) to foray into the untapped student-focused space and will deepen its engagement with the younger demographic. On the other hand, the deal will allow TribeVibe to leverage the BMS platform to drive engagement and list more of its offerings on the platform. 

A BMS spokesperson said, ”BookMyShow has deepened its partnership with TribeVibe through strategic investment for a majority stake. Having worked together as long term partners across formats, BookMyShow’s investment will aid TribeVibe’s growth trajectory with a 4X increase in revenue targeted over the next one year.”

BMS also plans to renew its focus on the younger audiences. The platform’s CEO and founder Ashish Hemrajani said, “Through this partnership, we will look to scale TribeVibe using our data analytics and in-depth consumer data as also expand the reach for brand partnerships that will be apt for this young audience cohort.”

Founded in 2019 by Shoven Shah, TribeVibe is an engagement platform for college festivals that helps colleges host events across multiple formats and genres. The startup also offers artist management, collaborating with them to produce college events across the country.

TribeVibe claims to have produced more than 600 shows and conducted more than 390 college festivals. It also claims to have partnered with 250 artists and generated a footfall of 9 Lakh at its various events.

With this move, BMS is aiming to consolidate the highly fragmented and unorganised sector. Most college festivals are organised by in-house teams within the institutions. However, as many festivals have grown in size, startups have stepped in to bridge the gap, bringing in professionalism to the job. College festivals such as IIT-Bombay’s Mood Indigo and IIT-Delhi’s Rendezvous feature big-ticket stars from Bollywood to YouTube. The budget of some of these festivals runs into crores, with footfall in lakhs.

The stake acquisition is in line with BMS’ recent efforts to liven up its product offerings and diversify in the post-COVID world. BMS was founded in 1999 by Ashish Hemrajani, Parikshit Dhar and Rajesh Balpande. The cloud-based online platform offers tickets for events, movies, sports and plays.

With theatres shut, BMS was badly hit during the COVID-19 pandemic. Its revenue fell and operating costs rose through the roof as the pandemic brought a halt to all such events. Such was the impact that the media and entertainment company laid off more than 270 employees during the first wave of the pandemic in 2020. 

The platform embraced the digital world and launched segments such as BookMyShow Stream to cater to online audiences.

BMS regained some sort of normalcy in its operations in October last year as the government eased restrictions and COVID-19 cases declined. The company reportedly sold 7 Mn movie tickets in nine days when occupancy restrictions were eased for movie halls during the month.  It continued its upward growth by selling 18 Mn tickets in December 2021.

Since then, business has been strong except for the months of January and February, when COVID-19 cases started rising again. Buoyed by the success of films such as The Kashmir Files and RRR, BMS sold a record 26 Mn tickets in March 2022, surpassing its previous high of 22 Mn tickets in January 2020.