Jungle Creations has raised £3 million in series A funding and set its sights on generating revenue of £100 million by 2021.
Set up by serial entrepreneur Jamie Bolding, Jungle Creations produces and distributes viral entertainment videos, generating billions of views from its millions of social media followers, and monetises these through sponsorship and advertising.
Since being set up in 2014, the company has created and commercialised some of Facebook’s most popular food, beauty and lifestyle brands including VT and Twisted.
Treehouse, its in-house creative and production agency, has since gone on to conceptualise and distribute social media video for the likes of Heinz, McDonald’s and Virgin.
“At a time when many media companies and brands have struggled to navigate the growing influence of the Google-Facebook duopoly, our deep understanding of social media, marketing and content creation has been instrumental in the company’s success,” said 27-year-old Bolding.
The £3 million round was led by Edge Investments. John Smith, former COO of Burberry and CEO of BBC Worldwide, has also invested through his partnership with Edge.
Headquartered in London, Jungle Creations will use the funding to grow its existing offices in New York and Los Angeles as well as Toronto, with a focus on building its global audience. The money will also allow the business to focus its attention on longer form content, such as short documentaries and TV mini-series.
Jungle Creations has also made a number of senior hires including The Guardian’s Charlotte Emmerson, who joins as CMO, with Brave Bison’s Jonathan Kitchen and Time Out’s James Evans joining as commercial director and chief financial officer respectively.
John Smith said: “Jamie has proven himself to be an incredibly inspiring and creative entrepreneur, and has built an exciting, ambitious and agile business, with an enviable audience.
“I’m delighted to be investing at such a pivotal time as the company looks to accelerate its international expansion with a number of promising and exciting ventures that will provide substantial revenue growth.”
Since its launch, Jungle Creations has grown to a multi-million-dollar digital media company with over 140 employees in four offices.
The company is now planning to further diversity its offering, from launching eCommerce site Lovimals.com to devising restaurant concepts, pop-up bars and cookbooks, and is targeting revenue of £17 million in FY 2018 and £100 million in 2021.