REG - Aferian PLC - Aferian acquires The Filter

AferianAnnouncement

05/04/2022 07:00

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RNS Number : 2127H  Aferian PLC  05 April 2022

RNS

 

5 April 2022
 

 

AFERIAN PLC

 

("Aferian", the "Company" or the "Group")

 

Acquisition of AI-powered video recommendation service The Filter

Complementary to the Group's 24i product offering, the acquisition is aligned
with the Group's 2025 strategy to address the convergence of streaming
services and traditional Pay TV

 

Aferian plc (LSE AIM: AFRN), the B2B video streaming solutions company, today
announces that it has acquired 100% of the issued share capital of Exabre
Limited, trading as The Filter ("The Filter"), a UK-headquartered AI-powered
video recommendation service (the "Acquisition").

 

Acquisition detail and rationale

 

The Filter's cutting-edge data science, analysis and machine learning
technologies help consumers find and watch more of the video content they
love. The Filter's customers include streaming providers Joyn in Germany, EPIX
in the USA and BBC Studio owned UKTV Play in the UK.

 

The Filter's technology will significantly accelerate the roadmap of 24i's
video streaming platform by adding enhanced analytics, recommendations and
personalisation to its existing data analytics services. 24i will also market
The Filter's managed service solution to its existing OTT and Pay TV customers
and prospects as a standalone service.

 

Led by The Filter's current CEO Damien Read, who will join 24i as SVP of Data
Products, The Filter's team of data scientists will continue to be based in
Bath and will work alongside 24i's existing data analytics team.

 

The move represents a further supportive step along the Group's 2025 strategy,
which addresses the convergence of streaming services and traditional Pay TV.
It is also in line with the Company's objective to acquire key and emerging
technologies that add value to its platform's capabilities by making it easier
for end consumers to find the video and content they love.

 

Consideration

The Filter generated a loss before tax of $0.5m for the year ended 31 December
2021 and had total assets of $1.0m as at 31 December 2021.

 

The initial consideration is £1.5m ($2.0m), satisfied in cash, of which
£1.2m ($1.6m) was paid on completion and £0.3m ($0.4m) has been deferred
until 18 months after the acquisition date.  Additional consideration is
payable, of up to £2.5m ($3.2m), subject to achieving certain annual
recurring revenue ("ARR") growth at increments of additional ARR of £0.5m
($0.6m).  The additional consideration will be settled in cash and payable in
two tranches, at the first and second anniversaries of the acquisition.

 

Donald McGarva, CEO of Aferian plc, said: "With The Filter's team expertise
in personalised, data-driven analytics and recommendations, this acquisition
will accelerate our vision of making it easier to connect people to the TV and
video they love. As part of 24i, The Filter's technology enhances and
complements our offering, as well as opening up new opportunities to the
business. I would like to welcome The Filter's team to the Group, and we look
forward to working with them over the coming years."

 

Damien Read, The Filter's CEO, who now becomes 24i's SVP of Data Products,
said: "The Filter has a history of significantly improving people's
entertainment experience though using cutting edge data science. We power
everything from the "recommended for you" rails in video streaming apps, to
personalised recommendations in marketing and even entirely dynamic user
interfaces that adapt to the individual consumer's viewing habits.
Continuously improving personalisation is enormously important to our
streaming customers and our powerful insights often help to shape their
strategic thinking. We are very excited to be joining the 24i family as this
will help us to further develop our offering and bring this game-changing
technology to a wider range of entertainment companies worldwide."

 

For further information please contact:

 

 Aferian plc                                                           +44 (0)1954 234100
 Mark Wells, Chairman

 Donald McGarva, Chief Executive Officer

 Mark Carlisle, Chief Financial Officer

 Investec plc                                                          +44 (0)20 7597 5970
 David Anderson / Patrick Robb / Nick Prowting / Cameron MacRitchie

 FTI Consulting (Financial communications)                             +44 (0)20 3727 1000
 Matt Dixon / Elena Kalinskaya

 

 

About Aferian plc

 

Aferian plc (AIM: AFRN) is a B2B video streaming solutions company. Our
end-to-end solutions bring live and on-demand video to every kind of screen.
We create the forward-thinking solutions that our customers need to drive
subscriber engagement, audience satisfaction, and revenue growth.

 

It is our belief that successful media companies and services will be those
that are most consumer-centric, data driven and flexible to change. We focus
on innovating technologies that enable our customers stay ahead of evolving
viewer demand by providing smarter, more cost-effective ways of delivering
end-to-end modern TV and video experiences to consumers. By anticipating
technological and behavioural audience trends, our software solutions empower
our customers to heighten viewer enjoyment, drive growth in audience share and
ultimately their profitability.

 

Aferian plc has two operating companies: 24i, which focusses on streaming
video experiences, and Amino, which connects Pay TV to streaming services. Our
two complementary companies combine their products and services to create
solutions which ensure that people can consume TV and video how and when they
want it. Our solutions deliver modern TV and video experiences every day to
millions of viewers globally, via our growing global customer base of over 500
service providers.

 

Aferian plc is traded on the London Stock Exchange's AIM stock market (AIM:
symbol AFRN). Headquartered in Cambridge, UK, the Company has over 350 staff
located in offices in San Francisco, Amsterdam, Helsinki, Copenhagen, Madrid,
Porto, Brno, Buenos Aires, and Hong Kong. For more information, please
visit www.aferian.com (http://www.aferian.com/) .

 

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