Startup Deep Dive : VideoVerse — how a Mumbai sports-AI startup raised over $100 million and sold Magnifi to Minute Media

The Indian company behind VideoVerse booked operating revenue of just ₹1.94 crore in the year to March 2023 and lost twice that much — a balance sheet smaller than a single mid-sized restaurant chain. Yet in September 2025 the same founding team sold its sports-AI platform, Magnifi, to New York-based Minute Media in a deal its lead backer called “one of the largest outcomes in the history of sports technology.”

That gap between what the Mumbai entity reported to India’s registrar and what the global business was actually worth is the whole story of VideoVerse. It is a company that raised roughly $103.8 million from investors including A91 Partners, Alpha Wave Global and Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal, ran most of its revenue through a US parent rather than its Indian arm, narrowed from a broad “video editing for everyone” pitch to a single sharp use case — turning live sport into instant highlights — and then exited before it ever had to prove it could stand alone. This is how that happened, with the numbers on each side.

Quick facts

What VideoVerse does

VideoVerse sells software that watches sport and cuts it into shareable clips without a human editor. Its flagship product, Magnifi, ingests a live or recorded feed, uses computer vision, natural-language processing and machine learning to spot the moments that matter — a goal, a wicket, a lead change — and produces highlight packages, short-form clips and social posts in near real time. A second product, Illusto, is a browser-based editor aimed at creators and small teams. The buyers are content owners and rights-holders: leagues, federations, broadcasters and streaming platforms who own hours of footage and need it turned into distributable moments fast.

The origin

The company began in 2016 as Toch.ai, founded by Vinayak Shrivastav with co-founders Saket Dandotia and Alok Patil. Shrivastav is an unusual founder for a deep-tech video company: a mechanical engineer from Pune University with an MBA from London Business School, he spent his early career as a venture investor working closely with media businesses. That vantage point is what he has described as the founding insight — the media sector sat on enormous volumes of video but was slow to adopt automation, so most of that footage was never turned into the short, fast content that audiences had started to expect. Patil brought the machine-learning depth as CTO; the early bet was that a model could learn what a “highlight” looks like across sports and formats. The Indian holding entity was incorporated in Mumbai on 20 May 2016 under the name Vogueme Technologies Private Limited, the legal shell that still carries the group’s Indian filings today.

The struggle years

The early years were a search for the right shape of the business, and the filings show the strain of that search. Two things stand out, both documented and neither flattering.

• The identity reset (2022). The company spent its first six years as Toch.ai before rebranding to VideoVerse in April 2022, alongside its Series B. A rebrand at that stage is rarely cosmetic; it marked a repositioning away from a generic “smart video” label toward a product-led identity built around Magnifi and Illusto.
• The cost of going global (FY23). As VideoVerse pushed abroad, the Indian entity’s expenses jumped 12.3 times to ₹5.8 crore in the year to March 2023, against operating revenue of only ₹1.94 crore. The result was a swing to a net loss of ₹3.84 crore, from a near-breakeven loss of just ₹1.33 lakh the year before (source: regulatory filings via thekredible/entrackr). The Indian arm was, on its own numbers, deeply loss-making — because the money and the growth had moved to the US parent, while the costs of building the technology still landed in Mumbai.

The deeper struggle was strategic. VideoVerse had two products pointing in two directions: Illusto chased the crowded, low-margin market of creator video editing, while Magnifi chased a narrow, high-value niche in sports. For years the pitch tried to hold both. The business that eventually got sold was the one that let go of “video for everyone” and committed to sport.

The turning point

The turning point was the decision to make Magnifi a sports-first, rights-holder product — and the proof came in September 2025, when Minute Media agreed to acquire VideoVerse. The deal value was not disclosed, but the framing on each side tells you the scale of the swing. On one side sat an Indian entity that had reported under ₹2 crore of operating revenue and a ₹3.84 crore loss in FY23. On the other, Bluestone Equity Partners — which had led VideoVerse’s December 2023 round and held the company for roughly 20 months — described the sale as “one of the largest outcomes in the history of sports technology,” and said it would retain an equity interest in the combined Minute Media. A business that looked marginal in Indian filings had become, in dollar terms and to a strategic buyer, one of the bigger sports-tech exits on record.

The money behind it

VideoVerse raised roughly $103.8 million across its life as an independent company, on the way to the Minute Media exit. The rounds, from public reporting:

• Series A — October 2021, about $11.75–12 million. Backers included Moneta Ventures, Baring Private Equity India, Ventureast and Binny Bansal (sources: Clay; entrackr — figures cited in this range across trackers).
• Series B — April 2022, $46.8 million. Led by A91 Partners and Alpha Wave Global, with participation from Binny Bansal; announced alongside the Toch.ai-to-VideoVerse rebrand (sources: BusinessWire, Business Standard, entrackr).
• Later round — December 2023, $45 million. Led by Bluestone Equity Partners, earmarked for geographic and vertical expansion (sources: entrackr, Indian Startup News).

Total raised is reported at about $103.8 million (entrackr) and up to about $105 million by some trackers (Clay); at $1 ≈ ₹96.0 (Trading Economics, 18 September 2026) that is roughly ₹996 crore. What each backer changed:

• Binny Bansal — the Flipkart co-founder’s early participation gave the company Indian marquee credibility across its Series A and B.
• A91 Partners and Alpha Wave Global — the Series B leads funded the global expansion and the shift to an enterprise sports focus.
• Bluestone Equity Partners — the late-stage lead that took the company through to a sale within about 20 months and kept a stake in the acquirer.

How it makes money

VideoVerse is a business-to-business SaaS company: it earns by licensing Magnifi to rights-holders and broadcasters, typically on subscription or usage-linked contracts, rather than by selling ads or clips itself. The economics, as the company and its cloud partner have described them:

• Money in: recurring software fees from leagues, federations, broadcasters and streamers for automated highlight generation, clipping and distribution.
• Costs out: heavy compute for real-time video inference, model development, and a technical team — the reason the Indian entity’s expenses ran far ahead of its revenue.
• The efficiency pitch (source: AWS case study): Magnifi claims to cut customers’ video production costs by about 70% and production time by about 90%, and to onboard a new customer in about 15 minutes versus a couple of days previously.
• The performance pitch: the platform reports a 400% improvement in model inference speed, processing about 220 frames per second across 40-plus machine-learning models (source: AWS case study).
• The part people get wrong: the value is not “an AI that edits video.” It is speed against a live clock — a highlight that lands seconds after the moment is worth far more to a rights-holder than the same clip an hour later, and that latency is the product.

The numbers

The figures below are for the Indian entity (Vogueme Technologies Private Limited) as filed with India’s registrar and reported by financial trackers. They capture the India operations only; most of the group’s revenue was booked through the US parent and does not appear here. Unit: ₹ crore.

• Revenue at the India entity rose more than 3x, from ₹0.53 crore in FY22 to ₹1.94 crore in FY23 (source: thekredible/entrackr, citing regulatory filings).
• Expenses rose about 12.3x to ₹5.8 crore in FY23, driving the swing from a near-nil loss to ₹3.84 crore.
• These India-entity numbers are small by design: they sit alongside the roughly $103.8 million the group raised globally, which is the more meaningful measure of its scale.

Where the money comes from

VideoVerse’s revenue is concentrated in sports rights-holders and broadcasters, spread across markets rather than any single home geography. Named customers and partners include:

• Federations and leagues: the Portugal Football Federation, Danish football leagues, Formula E, and the ECHL — the North American hockey league whose 28 member teams used Magnifi across the 2024-25 season.
• Broadcasters and streamers: Sony LIV, which used Magnifi’s automated highlights for the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, and Willow TV.
• Global platforms: FIFA+, plus US college programmes such as the University of Nevada and the Mountain West Conference.

The surprise sits in the split between the Indian and global books. Judged only on Indian filings, VideoVerse looks like a sub-₹2-crore company. Judged on its customer list and the capital behind it, it is a globally distributed sports-tech vendor whose real revenue base was always outside India — which is exactly why the Indian entity could be loss-making while the group commanded a landmark exit.

The risks

Even in a successful exit, the risk profile is concrete and worth naming.

• Customer concentration. A B2B model built on a handful of large league, federation and broadcaster contracts means the loss of one anchor client can move revenue sharply. Deal-by-deal enterprise selling also lengthens sales cycles and makes revenue lumpy.
• Competition and commoditisation. Automated sports highlights are a contested market — well-funded specialists compete directly, and generative AI is lowering the cost of clipping video for everyone. If “instant highlights” becomes a commodity feature, pricing power erodes.
• Cost structure and cloud dependence. Real-time inference across dozens of ML models is compute-heavy; the FY23 jump in expenses to ₹5.8 crore at the India entity shows how quickly costs scale, and margins depend on cloud pricing the company does not control.
• Loss of independence. As part of Minute Media from September 2025, Magnifi’s roadmap now serves a larger group strategy. Integration risk — retaining the team, keeping customers through the transition, and fitting into an existing distribution stack such as STN Video — is real and outside the founders’ sole control.

The takeaway

The transferable lesson is about where a company chooses to book its life. VideoVerse looked unremarkable in the one place most Indian observers check first — the registrar’s filings — because it had deliberately built its revenue, its customers and its value in a US parent and a global market. The founders picked a narrow, high-value problem (turning live sport into instant highlights), moved the centre of gravity to where those buyers were, and accepted a loss-making Indian entity as the cost of that structure. The result was an exit that dwarfed anything the Indian numbers implied. For founders, the point is not that Indian filings mislead; it is that the shape of a company — which entity holds the customers, where the market is, which single problem it solves — matters more to the outcome than the headline revenue line in any one jurisdiction.

Frequently asked questions

What is VideoVerse and what does it sell?

VideoVerse is a video-AI company whose main product, Magnifi, automatically detects key moments in sports footage and turns them into highlights and short-form clips in near real time. It sells this as B2B software to leagues, federations, broadcasters and streaming platforms. It also runs Illusto, a browser-based video editor.

What is the legal entity behind VideoVerse?

The Indian holding entity is Vogueme Technologies Private Limited (CIN U74999MH2016PTC281381), incorporated in Mumbai on 20 May 2016. The business operated globally as Toch.ai before rebranding to VideoVerse in 2022, with a US parent that carried most of the group’s revenue.

How much money did VideoVerse raise?

About $103.8 million in total (roughly ₹996 crore at $1 ≈ ₹96.0), across a Series A of about $11.75–12 million in October 2021, a $46.8 million Series B in April 2022 led by A91 Partners and Alpha Wave Global, and a $45 million round in December 2023 led by Bluestone Equity Partners. Some trackers cite up to about $105 million.

Was VideoVerse acquired?

Yes. Minute Media, a New York-based digital sports-media group, announced its acquisition of VideoVerse in September 2025. The deal value was not disclosed; Bluestone Equity Partners, which led VideoVerse’s 2023 round, called it one of the largest outcomes in sports-technology history and kept an equity stake in Minute Media.

Why was the Indian entity loss-making despite the big exit?

The Indian entity reported operating revenue of ₹1.94 crore and a net loss of ₹3.84 crore in FY23 because most of the group’s revenue was booked through its US parent, while a large share of technology and staff costs landed in Mumbai. The Indian filings capture the India operations only, not the global business that was sold.

Sources

Figures are as of September 2026. Currency converted at $1 ≈ ₹96.0 as of 18 September 2026 (Trading Economics).

• GlobeNewswire / Minute Media — “Minute Media Acquires VideoVerse, Owner of Magnifi,” September 2025
• Bluestone Equity Partners — “Bluestone Equity Partners Announces Sale of VideoVerse to Minute Media,” September 2025
• Sports Video Group — “Minute Media Acquires Magnifi Owner VideoVerse in AI Shakeup,” September 2025
• Yahoo Finance / Moneta Ventures — “Moneta Ventures’ Portfolio Company VideoVerse Acquired by Minute Media,” September 2025
• entrackr — “VideoVerse raises $45 Mn in new round led by Bluestone Equity,” December 2023
• BusinessWire — “VideoVerse, Previously Known As Toch AI, Expands Globally Raising $46.8M In Series B,” April 2022
• Business Standard — “Video editing tech firm VideoVerse raises $46.8 mn to expand globally,” April 2022
• thekredible / entrackr — “VideoVerse records 3X rise in revenue in FY23, swings to losses,” 2024 (India-entity financials)
• Clay — “How Much Did VideoVerse Raise? Funding & Key Investors,” 2026
• AWS Case Studies — “VideoVerse Optimizes AI-Powered Sports Video Analytics and Editing,” 2024
• ClearTax / IndiaFilings / The Company Check — Vogueme Technologies Private Limited, CIN U74999MH2016PTC281381 (entity registration)
• Authority Magazine / Grit Daily — founder background interviews with Vinayak Shrivastav, 2022-2023

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