Dose, Formerly Spartz Media, Raises $25 Million Series B Financing, Led By Tribune Media

Dose, Formerly Spartz Media, Raises $25 Million Series B Financing, Led By Tribune Media

A strategic technology and advertising partnership will fuel continued development of best-in-breed digital publishing technology and new multi-platform programming opportunities

CHICAGO, Dec. 9, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Dose Media LLC today announced that it has closed on $25 million of Series B financing, led by Tribune Media Company and joined by Tayori LLC, an investment vehicle of Ronin Capital Chief Executive Officer John Stafford III. Dose also announced it has changed its name from Spartz Media. Dose will use the funds raised to enter into new content verticals, launch a video studio, add employees and grow its audience dramatically.

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In the past year, Dose, the company behind Dose.com and OMGFacts.com, saw growth of more than 400% in its platform audience - increasing monthly unique visitors to its websites from 12 million to 50 million. The company expects its audience to surpass 100 million monthly unique visitors in the next year. Dose's unique predictive technology detects "stories worth sharing," enabling the company's content team to publish the stories with the highest virality potential to the right audiences, including Dose's more than 25 million social media followers.

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"We're building the most technologically-advanced digital media company in the world," said Emerson Spartz, Chief Executive Officer of Dose Media. "Our technology is space age compared to most media companies, but Stone Age compared to what it will be."

As part of its investment in Dose, Tribune Media gains access to proprietary technology adding to its existing capabilities around story discovery and content publishing. As the company continues to expand its reach online with record traffic across its 42 local digital properties, Tribune Media looks to leverage Dose's data science to optimize existing national entertainment and sports destinations. The parties have also entered into an advertising agreement which will enhance cross-platform sales and bring advertisers closer to the most desirable audiences.

"There's no one in the industry today who knows how to engineer virality better than the Dose team," said Josh Cogswell, Tribune Media's Chief Product Officer. "Now working hand-in-hand with our award-winning journalists and storytellers, Emerson and his technologists are primed to reshape the way media is created and optimized for the next demanding audience and sophisticated marketer."

Building on explosive 800% revenue growth over the past year, Dose is also beginning to innovate with native advertising experiences for brands.

"Native advertising in its current form is broken. Brand advertisers pay for impressions but have to cross their fingers to achieve results. We aim to change that," said Spartz.

This partnership aims to provide the advertising industry with an innovative, performance-based product that delivers virality for advertisers and agencies, bolstered by the broad reach of television.

Houlihan Lokey served as financial advisor to Dose in the transaction.

ABOUT DOSE
Dose, the Chicago-based company behind Dose.com and OMGFacts.com, is one of the world's fastest growing media companies with 50 million monthly visitors. Dose's predictive technology detects "stories worth sharing". The company's content team covers the best stories, which Dose's publishing platform shares with the right audience. Dose was founded by Emerson Spartz and Gaby Spartz, who both founded popular websites at the age of 12. Gaby founded Daily Cute, a website for lovers of all things cute. Emerson founded Mugglenet, the world's most popular Harry Potter site, and grew the site to 50 million monthly page views. This experience inspired Emerson to discover what made content go viral and harness that knowledge into a business. In addition to serving as the company's CEO, Emerson is also one of the world's leading experts on Internet virality and has been featured in major media outlets including the Wall Street Journal, CBS, CNBC, The New Yorker, MSNBC, Fox News, and CNN.

ABOUT TRIBUNE MEDIA
Tribune Media Company (NYSE: TRCO) is home to a diverse portfolio of television and digital properties driven by quality news, entertainment and sports programming. Tribune Media is comprised of Tribune Broadcasting's 42 owned or operated local television stations reaching more than 50 million households, national entertainment network WGN America, available in approximately 73 million households, Tribune Studios, and Gracenote, one of the world's leading sources of TV, music and sports metadata, powering electronic program guides in televisions, automobiles and mobile devices. Tribune Media also includes Chicago's WGN-AM, and the national multicast networks Antenna TV and THIS TV. Additionally, the Company owns and manages a significant number of real estate properties across the U.S. and holds other strategic investments in media. For more information please visit www.tribunemedia.com.

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SOURCE Dose Media LLC

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Dose Media LLC

CONTACT: DOSE MEDIA CONTACT: Courtney Cohen, SSPR, 312-750-0871, ccohen@sspr.com; TRIBUNE MEDIA CONTACT: Gary Weitman, SVP/Corporate Relations, 312-222-3394, gweitman@tribunemedia.com; INTERIM INVESTOR RELATIONS CONTACT: Lisa Kampf, Finsbury, 312-560-6178, lisa.kampf@finsbury.com

Web Site: http://www.tribunemedia.com


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