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Fox Buys Meet Cute // Goes on Deal Spree in Creator x Podcasting

By Chris Erwin

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Let’s break it down…

–SELLER: Meet Cute–

Overview

• Audio drama and scripted podcast business focused on romantic-comedy and narrative fiction

• Founded by Naomi Shah in 2019

• Raised $9M+ from institutional investors including Union Square Ventures and Advancit Capital

• Unknown FT headcount (guess is < 10), plus network of freelance writers and producers

• HQ’d in New York City

Founding Story

• Before founding Meet Cute in 2019, Shah worked as a Goldman Sachs equities trader and at Union Square Ventures 

• Shah saw gap in market for lighthearted, inclusive romantic comedies in audio

• Inspired by how “stories of love and human connection” could make listeners feel uplifted in daily moments, much like music

• Emphasized diverse writers’ rooms, inclusive casting for modern relationships

• Early series “When I Met You” and “A Nice Holiday” helped Meet Cute reach millions of platform streams by 2022

Company Highlights

• Reported 15M cumulative streams by 2023

• Estimated ~2M+ listeners across platforms

• Library of 350+ original short-form episodes across 100+ unique story titles

• Audience skews 70% female, primarily Gen Z and millennial

• Collaborated with well-known voice talent including Sherry Cola, Kesha, and Rachel Brosnahan

• Notable partnerships and cross-promotions with Spotify, Wondery, iHeartMedia

Business Lines

• Content Formats…

• Scripted audio fiction series (rom-com, fantasy-romance, drama)

• Rapid-turn serialized audio seasons (monthly releases)

• Monetization… 

• Podcast ad placements and brand integrations

• Sponsorships and distribution deals with Spotify, Apple, and other platforms

• Licensing & IP Commercialization…

• Licensing original IP for film, TV and streaming

• Managing audio-to-screen adaptation pipeline with studios and streamers

Capital Markets History

• Nov ‘25 Acquired by Fox Entertainment 

• Nov ‘20 Raised $6.3M in Series A funding from Union Square Ventures, Lerer Hippeau, Phoenix Court, and NVP Capital

• Jan ‘20 Raised $3M in seed funding from Union Square Ventures and Advancit Capital

–BUYER: Fox Entertainment–

Overview

• Media and entertainment company with operations across broadcast TV, scripted and unscripted studio production, content sales / licensing and digital-platform strategies

• Subsidiary of Fox Corp, created after Disney’s $71B purchase of 21st Century Fox

• Sits alongside Fox News Media and Fox Sports to fill the gaps left by the sale of 20th Century Fox' s TV and film units

• HQ’d in New York City

• ~1,350 associated members via LI

Company Highlights

• Generated $3.7B in Q1 FY2026 revenue, driven by advertising, sports rights, and global content licensing

• Reorganized in 2024 into Network, Studios, and Global Distribution divisions to streamline operations and expand international reach

• Expanded IP portfolio through acquisitions including TMZ (2021), MarVista Entertainment (2021), and Bento Box (2019)

• Made a strategic investment in Holywater (Oct 2025) to grow short-form and creator-led content

• Produces major franchises like The Masked Singer, 9-1-1: Lone Star, and Krapopolis, plus a broad slate of animated and unscripted series

Business Lines

• Network broadcast television

• Studio production (scripted, unscripted, animation)

• Content sales/licensing globally

• Digital and creator-driven platforms

–BUYER PARENT CO: Fox Corp–

Overview / Company Highlights 

• Major U.S. broadcast and cable TV network operating leading news, sports, and entertainment channels

• Operates cable, television, and digital media networks

• Operates 6 top-150 US TV broadcast / cable channels

• (Fox News, FOX, Fox Sports 1, Fox Business Network, Fox Deportes, and Fox Sports 2)

Stock Performance

• Listed on NASDAQ: FOX

• $60 as of Nov 11, 2025

• Up 2.8% MoM 

• Up 31.3% YoY 

Financials (USD)

(per public filings)

• 2H 2025 Projection…

• 2H 2025E Revenue: $7.7B, up 17.1% YoY

• 2H 2024 Revenue: $6.5B 

• 2H 2025 Adj EBITDA: $1.8B, up  7.1% YoY

• 2H 2024 Adj EBITDA: $1.6B
  

• FY 2024…

• Revenue: $14B, down 6.3% YoY

• Adj EBITDA: $2.9B, down 10.2% YoY

• Adj EBITDA Margin: 20.4%

• Net loss: $1.6B, down 11.8% YoY
  

Valuation

(per stockanalysis.com as of [11/13/2025])

• Mkt Cap: $29.0B

• C&CE:$4.37M

• Total Debt: $7.45M

• Enterprise Value: $32.14B
  

• Enterprise Value Multiples…

• 2024 Revenue: 2.3x

• 2024 EBITDA: 11.4x

• LTM June 2025 Revenue: 2.0x

• LTM June 2025 EBITDA: 10.3x 

Capital Markets History

• Nov ‘25 Acquired Meet Cute

• Jul ‘25 Acquired a 33% stake in Penske Entertainment

• Jun ‘25 Acquired Caliente TV    

• Feb ‘25 Acquired Red Seat Ventures

• Mar ‘19 IPOd

–DEAL DETAILS–

Overview

• Announced November 4, 2025

• No deal details disclosed 

• NOTE: See POV on deal ROI below in What Else I Find Interesting section

Strategic Rationale

• Expands Fox’s storytelling pipeline with Meet Cute’s library of short-form scripted audio series, creating a new source of adaptable IP for TV, film, and streaming.

• Positions Meet Cute as a rapid-development incubator, allowing Fox to test concepts quickly and use audience data to guide which stories could scale into larger franchises.

• “From day one, Meet Cute’s mission was to build stories at the speed of culture. Joining Fox Entertainment allows us to scale that vision — giving creators a faster path from idea to audience, integrating real-time audience feedback, and bringing new voices and formats to life across Fox’s global platforms,” said Naomi Shah, Founder of Meet Cute.

• Expands Fox’s portfolio of owned IP, which enables higher margin business opportunities VS having to license 3rd party IP. The key will be proving that audio incubation can translate to bigger digital and traditional distribution opportunities. 

• “Innovation in digital storytelling is shaping the future of entertainment, and with Meet Cute, we’re building a space where creators can move fast, take risks, and shape what’s next,” said Hannah Pillemer, Head of Scripted at Fox Entertainment Studios. “It’s a creative lab for storytelling - developing and testing new voices and IP in real time and connecting bold, emotionally resonant stories to audiences everywhere.”

Post-Deal Operations

• Meet Cute continues operating under its brand within Fox Entertainment Studios.

• Naomi Shah joins Fox as SVP of Operations & Strategy under EVP Fernando Szew, bringing startup-born leadership and operational agility to the division.

• Shah will focus on AI innovation, entertainment technology, and IP expansion across scripted and digital development.

• Integration expected with Fox’s existing audio and vertical-video initiatives, including Holywater and Red Seat Ventures, to share data, creator pipelines, and audience insights.
  

 –WHAT ELSE I FIND INTERESTING–

• POV on investor ROI based on $9M of VC investment back in 2020.

• Meet Cute raised a lot of money as a podcast startup, a little over $9M back in 2020.

• This was a period when there was much excitement around podcasting; that audio was the next major media market for audiences, and would be a very efficient medium to incubate and test IP, before taking it mainstream.

• I believe in all of that, but the opportunity is more true today than it was 5 years ago...and yet, there’s still a ways to go!  

• Back in 2020, the market size was significantly smaller VS now in 2025; the podcast audience was smaller, there were fewer advertising dollars flowing into podcasting (both direct sponsorships and programmatic), and other revenue lines around licensing, touring, merch were also more limited. 

• But hindsight is always 20-20, and there was a lot of investor hype around the space. Media investing has always been considered sexy, and Silicon Valley loves Hollywood (and vice versa). Therefore, all types of investors got excited, including VC, which has an investment framework and return model that is not a good fit for media-native business models.

• This led to a hype cycle in the podcast market, which resulted in over investment from the wrong types of investor. The result, was that expectations around revenue and exit values weren’t realized, and there was a pull back from investors. So the market shook out i.e. companies leaned out or went out of business…which eventually paved the way for better building and better investor matching to take place. We’re now in this new growth cycle in podcasting, which kicked off in a major way when Insignia acquired VeritoneONE and Oxford Road in 2024 for $100M+ (I wrote about this in our deal analysis). This also aligns with the new growth cycle for the overall creator economy. 

• As it relates to Meet Cute, I think they were a victim of too much money, too early in the market cycle. And market timing matters. 

• (Before I expand on that point, a point to highlight: I believe the general thesis behind Meet Cute is compelling as it relates to the overall future of media – it just needs the right home, with existing audience and content resources, hence Fox. Further, I believe Naomi has great potential as a new media and business leader – she’s sharp, ambitious, has vision, can sell in the room, and has a lot more energy to continue building. She’s a great get for Fox.)

• Back to my note on market timing…$9M of investment feels more than could be justified by the market size and revenue models available in 2020. Therefore, I bet that if Naomi were to do it again today, and what I’d recommend to a founder in a similar position, is to raise less money (and protect the cap table), build and test new content biz models with leaner cost structures, and then based on success of revenue and audience traction, figure out where to double down. 

• I think of leaner, modern content bets like how digital studio Gymnasium (fka as FaZeWorld) raised a $750k seed round in 2023 (our deal analysis), or how Unicorn, a hybrid talent management x digital studio, raised a $1M seed from Powerhouse and various angel investors earlier this year (our deal analysis, and we’re an advisor). 

• My takeaway from all this, is that there probably wasn’t a high price tag for the deal. Due to the liquidation preference that comes with VC investment, there was likely a high hurdle of over $9M to clear before Naomi and her team got any financial benefit from deal consideration. It’d be great if the sale at least met that threshold, but my guess (reminder, this is complete speculation), is that the hurdle wasn’t met. NOTE: this analysis doesn’t account for Naomi’s employment agreement, which likely has meaningful financial value via salary, bonus, benefits, and stock options.

• That being said, I do think this deal is a win for the Meet Cute team, Fox, and the overall podcast market more broadly.

• Now, Naomi and her team can continue building against their scripted audio incubation thesis, but within a larger podcast market now in 2025, and inside one of the world’s largest media organizations, where rapid and efficient IP incubation can have meaningful audience and cultural reach, and generate real revenue.

• Further, this deal is part of a wave of a lot of exciting new creator x digital dealmaking occurring across Fox Corp (see breakout list below). As an SVP in Fox Entertainment tasked with helping lead the charge for social x digital content and IP innovation, which will likely include both commercial and corporate dealmaking, that’s an exciting place to be! 

• Podcast M&A activity has been ramping since mid 2024; now in 2H of 2025, commercial dealmaking in podcasting is surging!

• I wrote about growing podcast market momentum in our deal analysis of Audioboom buying Adelicious for £4.5M plus earnout, and also in our deal analysis of Podx paying $30M for Lemonada.

• But over the past couple months, we’re seeing landmark commercial deals get announced. Will this kick off a new cycle of large scale commercial activity, similar to how Insignia’s $100M+ purchase of Veritone ONE and Oxford Road in 2024 kicked off an ensuing wave of podcast M&A?

• I believe yes. Let’s highlight some recent deal activity…

• TikTok and iHeartMedia just launched a first of its kind partnership to create up to 25 podcasts hosted by TikTok creators, complete with co-branded studios in LA, New York, and Atlanta.

• The move follows Netflix’s reported talks to license video podcasts from iHeart, highlighting how streaming giants now view podcast IP as a pipeline for original content.

• And at the end of October, Fox-owned Tubi also struck a licensing deal with Ashley Flowers’ Audiochuck (rumored at $150M per the WSJ), bringing top true-crime podcasts like Crime Junkie and The Deck to its streaming platform.

• Which follows the major partnership announced between Netflix and Spotify, where the world’s largest video streaming platform will license a portfolio of podcast titles ranging across sports, culture / lifestyle, and true crime. 

• This surge comes as social platforms like TikTok, Threads, and LinkedIn introduce new podcast discovery and creator tools, deepening creator monetization opportunities.

• …overall, its an exciting moment for all of us who’ve been rooting for podcasting for years. The macro tailwinds behind podcast consumer behavior and media consumption, advertiser spend, and IP and community development, and trans media potential, have always been very compelling. 

• My fave stat from Dan Granger, CEO of Oxford Road: Audio is over 20% of overall media consumption, but only 5% of media ad spend. That gap will close, and audio, and specifically podcasting, will win big!

• That being said, let’s keep the dealmaking smart and right-sized, and ROI-focused, so the growth cycle persists! 

• Like Paramount, Fox is signaling to the market that its open for business, though with a specific focus on creator, podcasting, and social video.

• In our deal analysis of Paramount buying the Free Press for a reported $150M, I wrote about why “Paramount is quickly making BIG moves to establish its new content identity, and compete in the modern media era.” 

• Specifically, that “Paramount seeks to define its new content identity and audience focus for competitive differentiation VS peer streamers and media networks”, which included a flurry of recent deals following the acquisition by Skybound and the Ellisons, including “the recent $7.7B UFC licensing partnership and the multi-year film and content deal with Call of Duty’s gaming IP, to recruiting the Duffer Brothers away from Netflix, re-upping of the South Park relationship, and continued partnership with prolific producer Taylor Sheridan (Yellowstone, Tulsa King, Landman, 1923).”

• I see parallels to Fox, which sees the overall media economy, including its core business models, going through generational disruption. Its ramp up in digital dealmaking throughout 2025 signals that Fox leadership wants to reposition itself for how modern audiences consume content, and how to monetize that content.

• As a result, Fox Corp has kicked off quite a wave of creator and digital-focused dealmaking. What’s interesting, is that this dealmaking is happening on 2 sides of the Fox house!

• On one side is Fox Entertainment, which did the Meet Cute deal of today’s newsletter, invested in BJ Novak’s food experience company Chain (shoutout to cofounders and RockWater friends Byron Ashley and Jack Davis!), and also invested in Holywater, a vertical video company. Fox Entertainment also partnered up with celebrity chef Gordan Ramsay in 2024 to launch Bite, a food and entertainment brand.

• Then another division of Fox Corp, Tubi Media Group, is where Red Seat Ventures sits, which is a creator services company for many leading conservative media and broadcast personalities, helping them to build D2C media brands. That RSV acquisition in early 2025 brought in new digital leadership in brothers Chris and Kevin Balfe, who have a mandate to be aggressive in building out Fox’s business in the modern creator x media economy. Case in point, they were key players in setting up the rumored $150M (per WSJ) audio licensing deal with Ashley Flowers’ Audiochuck, bringing top true-crime podcasts like Crime Junkie and The Deck to the Tubi streaming platform away from SiriusXM.

• Then there’s also Fox Advertising, which invested in The Lighthouse, a studio and campus for creators that’s part of The Whalar Group (our deal analysis). I believe Fox Advertising sits at the Fox corporate level and serves the various divisions, but I can’t say for sure. 

• But, what is for sure is that the Fox organization is a bit hard to navigate, and its a bit funky that these deals are sitting across various business units. Curious to how this all might get reorged over time…

• And on a final note, it’s great to see traditional media buyers finally making meaningful bets and moves in the creator space. I put the recent sale of our client the Feedfeed to People Inc. (part if IAC) into this bucket as well (our deal analysis). I’ve been educating these traditional media buyers on the creator space for over a decade, and its great to see them finally start to put real capital to work. IMO, their future depends on it!

• I interviewed Naomi Shah in 2021 on my The Come Up podcast.

• You can listen to it here. Here’s the intro to the episode…

• “I first met Naomi a few months ago via Meagan Loyst at Lerer Hippeau, one of the investors in Meet Cute. I had asked Meagan if she knew of any awesome female founders, and she immediately said I had to meet the CEO of one of audio’s most exciting new startups. 

• So when I looked Naomi up, I noticed she had a background of STEM academics and then Wall Street and VC, and I couldn’t put together why she had started a romcom media company. But after our interview, it all made complete sense.

• Getting to know Naomi has been a delight, and I’m thrilled to tell her story.  We discuss her early passion for STEM, being a Goldman Sachs equity trader, leaving VC to be a founder, why a rom-com podcast network solves a problem in the wellbeing market, raising $6M of capital during COVID, and how a non-Hollywood background makes her a better media entrepreneur.”

• Fox expands its storytelling footprint with Gen Z focused platforms.

• Fox’s investments in Holywater and Meet Cute show a clear push to reach younger viewers through short-form video and story-driven podcasts.

• Holywater reaches over 55 million users with vertical dramas on apps like My Drama and My Muse, catering to Gen Z’s mobile-first viewing habits.

• Meet Cute adds a library of romantic, character-focused podcasts that speak to the same audience, creating crossover potential between audio and video formats.

• Together, the deals give Fox a low-cost way to test new ideas and grow IP that can later expand into film or TV. They also position Fox as one of the few traditional studios building a modern storytelling pipeline for younger audiences across formats and platforms.

• This also makes me think of the potential market-changing bet that the Ellisons might be maneuvering towards with the combination of Paramount and Warner Bros Discovery, along with the acquisition of TikTok US – which would result in a massive library of premium studio content IP fed into into the fastest-growing social video platform. That has the potential to fundamentally alter the traditional and social media landscape in the US, and set a massive new global media precedent, and under a very powerful new owner. But its late and we need to get this newsletter out, so I’ll end the piece on that note… 

I'm the founder of RockWater Industries. We do M&A and strategy advisory for creator economy and social / audio agencies. From buy and sell-side M&A and fundraising to market research and go-to-market planning. 

DM me on LinkedIn or email [email protected]

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