US private equity fund Francisco Partners and IGP Capital have acquired over 90% of Israeli live IP video solutions company LiveU at a company valuation of $200 million. The balance will remain in the hands of the Kfar Saba company's founders and Eran Gorev of Francisco Partners will become LiveU's chairman.
LiveU, which was founded in 2006 by CEO Samuel Wasserman, COO Avichai Cohen and CTO Rony Ohayon, has raised $50 million from investors including Viola Ventures, Lightspeed Ventures, Canaan Partners and Pitango Venture Capital. The company's last financing round was in 2012 when it raised $27 million and the company has reported that it has been profitable for the past four years.
LiveU has 230 employees in 20 countries worldwide including 130 employees at its development center in Israel. The company's customers include leading TV channels such as the BBC, Sky, Fox, and in sport the NFL.
LiveU has developed a system that replaces satellites for live broadcasts, broadcasting video over cellular networks instead of satellite networks. The system divides up transmissions into several SIM cards and streams over the cellullar network in a way that ensures reliable broadcasts that do not stop or get stuck due to breakdowns.
LiveU's device comes as a backpack or pouch, which connects to the TV camera and sends the video to the company's cloud from where it is relayed to its destination. The company's system is used to broadcast live news events worldwide including Israel's recent elections, the royal wedding in England and the World Cup in Russia.
Wasserman told "Globes" that the new funding will enable future growth by adapting to 5G cellular networks and new cloud technology. "We didn't look to be sold," he said, "but due to the opportunity that came about we decided that this is the right time to take private equity investment, which will help us leverage the company. It's a strategic decision.
He added, "Technological developments and the developments of cellular networks allow us to provide to very many organizations the ability to create live, quality broadcasts - organizations that in the past could not do that because of the high cost of a mobile satellite."
"Today we can provide higher quality than the satellite and we are expanding to the world of sport, new media and the automotive sector. For example, we have in the company a group working on live video streaming from cars as they travel. In the world of the self-driving car, they will need to stream images to a control center and we can transmit the credible and stable data that is needed."
LiveU was represented by Advs. Raanan Lerner and Tomer Shani from Meitar Liquornik Geva Leshem Tal law firm. Francisco Partners was represented by Adv. Mimi Zemach from Zemach-Schneider.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on May 28, 2019
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