Noida, India – February 7, 2022 (GPN): Quint Digital Media Limited (QUINT, BSE 539515), India’s leading multi-brand digital media and media–tech conglomerate, being the only new-age digital media and technology player listed on an Indian stock exchange, published its results for the nine months ended December 31, 2021 today.  The Company has also completed the acquisition of identified stakes in the digital media and media-tech operations of Quintillion Business, Quintype Technologies, Spunklane Media and YKA Media.  

Speaking on the financial results and completion of the acquisition, Ms. Ritu Kapur, Co-Promoter & Chief Executive Officer, Quint Digital, said “With the acquisition of stakes in QBM, SMP, and YKA, Quint Digital is diversifying across demographics and geographies, bringing a larger community of readers and viewers into our fold.  QBM’s acquisition has added the most valuable learnings in running a successful premium subscription platform as the world gets ready for a rapid growth of reader revenues.  The expansion of audiences across various websites and new-age social media platforms, makes us way and away the largest pure play digital news and information group in the country.  We have close to doubled our group revenue base, giving us size and clout in the digital media space.   

Additionally, Quintype brings us cutting edge capabilities in media-tech, which is a critical strength given the current focus on digital innovation.”

 

A. Highlights of the financial performance: 

B. Highlights of the audience engagement:

The audience footprint across the websites and digital platforms – including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, Snapchat etc. – continued its strong momentum in the quarter.  Some of the key data points, aggregated across the websites and digital platforms, are given below:

Description/ Period	9 months ending	Quarter 3	Quarter 2	Quarter 1
December 31, 2021	FY2021-22
Page Views	418.4 Mn	220.8 Mn	104.2 Mn	93.4 Mn
Video Views	849.5 Mn	290 Mn	298.4 Mn	261.1 Mn
Unique Viewers	885 Mn	280.3 Mn	313.5 Mn	291.5 Mn
Impressions	9.83 Bn	3.30 Bn	3.01 Bn	3.52 Bn

Source: based on data provided by platforms/ other agencies

The digital properties had nearly 16.43 Mn subscribers/followers across various platforms at the end of Q3.

In the video space, as per Facebook Leader-Board, The Quint is the only new-age digital media portal that is rubbing shoulders with traditional and legacy media players. The Quint, including Quint Hindi and Quint Fit, has 7.8 Mn followers on Facebook, which is much ahead of a host of traditional media players and digital media players. The leadership of The Quint is even demonstrated by the number of followers (1.3 Mn) it has on the Instagram Leader-Board. 

Additionally, on Facebook, The Quint stands at the 8th position for interactions and 5th position for video views, ahead of the legacy Indian media players like NDTV, TOI & Indian Express.  Similarly, on Instagram, The Quint ranked at the 7th position for video views ahead of HT, Times Now, India Times & The Wire.

The brand and quality of journalism of The Quint is demonstrated by the fact that The Quint’s Tridip K Mandal won the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award for his documentary, ‘Diaries From the Detention Camps of Assam’.  In addition, other key awards won by The Quint in Q3 include RedInk 2021 Award in Human Rights (TV) Category, WAN-IFRA’s South Asian Digital Media Awards 2021 – Gold for Best Use of Online Video, which was awarded for Divya Talwar’s Life in an Auto: The Inspiring Story of 74-year-old Sole Breadwinner, Desraj Jyot Singh and Silver for Best News Website (or) Mobile Service.

 

C. Completion of acquisition of the digital media and media-tech operations: 

QDML has duly completed (on January 19, 2022) the acquisition of identified stakes in the digital media and media-tech operations of Quintillion Business Media Private Limited, Quintype Technologies India Private Limited, Spunklane Media Private Limited and YKA Media Private Limited.  

Post the completion of the acquisition, QDML owns:

1. 100% stake in Quintillion Business Media Private Limited (www.bloombergquint.com) 
2. 50.41% stake in Quintype Technologies India Private Limited (www.quintype.com) 
3. 47.92% stake in Spunklane Media Private Limited (www.thenewsminute.com) 
4. 34.6% stake in YKA Media Private Limited (www.youthkiawaaz.com) 

The acquisition was completed on January 19, 2022; hence, the financial results for the current quarter do not factor in the results from these operations. 

 

D. Fund raise to facilitate future growth of the company 

The Board of Directors approved raising of fresh capital of an amount not exceeding INR 125 Cr by way of a rights issue.  The proposed capital raise will go a long way in providing the necessary growth capital to the Company and further help to consolidate its leadership position among the new-age digital media and media-tech companies.  

The objective of the proposed rights issue is to, inter alia, meet the Company’s growth plans, including but not limited to undertaking strategic initiatives, general corporate purposes and/or such other use of proceeds as may be permitted under the applicable laws. 

The Board also formed the Rights Issue Committee to decide the terms and conditions of the rights issue including the use of Issue proceeds, rights entitlement ratio, the issue price, record date, timing of the Issue and other related matters.

Annexure A

INR in 000

Particulars	Q3 – December 31, 2021	Q3 – December 31, 2020	Nine months ended December 31, 2021	Nine months ended December 31, 2020
Revenue from Operations	92,543	62,271	252,465	145,716
Other Income	2,534	3,679	11,719	6,942
Total Income	95,077	65,950	264,184	152,657
Employee benefit expenses	23,565	24,320	69,572	82,420
Finance cost	2,501	2,329	7,720	6,661
Depreciation and amortization expense	19,739	6,276	52,362	14,715
Other expenses	28,754	21,036	83,265	65,277
Total Expenses	74,560	53,961	212,919	169,073
Exceptional Items	5,000	–	5,000	5,736
Profit before tax	15,517	11,989	46,266	(22,152)
Tax expenses	4,430	10,177	11,970	913
Profit after tax	11,086	1,812	34,296	(23,065)

About The Quint 

The Quint is driven by the truth and the readers who seek it. What makes us different from most legacy media is that we consistently challenge the status quo — through in-depth, visually powerful, community-driven stories, features, and interactive multimedia formats. 

Our team is a collective of reporters, storytellers, editors, producers, designers, and analysts, who have cut their teeth on the best news teams in the country. At the helm, we have some of the best minds in the industry who have honed their craft for years in the media and today lead a fearless newsroom into 21st-century, cutting-edge journalism. 

As a newsroom, we seek to be as diverse as possible, with a special focus on gender — such that our news represents the issues and voices of all sections of society. We are participative in our approach to newsgathering – with a robust citizen journalism vertical, My Report – and we partner with our readers in our hunt for fake news, through our WebQoof vertical. Our reporters fan out into deep interiors of the country for ground reports — finding stories that often get drowned out in prime-time debates. We have eminent authors writing for our Opinion section and we aim to bring as much diversity to the voices on our site as possible. 

The Quint makes sense of the systematic chaos that is the world today and brings you the story however you want – on your phone, through videos, op-eds, infographics, animations, and documentaries.

For more information, visit www.quintdigitalmedia.com.