Gimlet Media Raises $15 Million From Stripes Group, Emerson Collective

The podcasting startup, which has raised $22 million in funding since 2014, has tripled its number of productions and is looking to expand its efforts to adapt projects for film and television.

Gimlet Media, the podcasting startup behind the shows StartUp, Reply All and Homecoming, has raised a new round of $15 million in financing from investors including Stripes Group and Laurene Powell Jobs' Emerson Collective.

Stripes, a growth equity firm with investments in Refinery29 and Blue Apron, led the round, and operating partner Patrick Keane has joined Gimlet's board as part of the transaction. Other participants in the round include existing investors Graham Holdings, Cross Culture Ventures and Betaworks.

Alex Blumberg and Matt Lieber co-founded Gimlet in 2014, launching with one podcast, StartUp, about the creation of the company. Now, the Brooklyn-based company has 15 shows, having tripled its production over the last year. Meanwhile, it has been aggressive about adapting its projects for film and television. StartUp was the basis for midseason ABC comedy Alex Inc. starring Zach Braff, and a Homecoming adaptation starring Julia Roberts has been given a two-season order at Amazon.

The company will use the cash infusion to continue to expand its programing and also grow its film and television development pipeline, taking a more direct role in the adaptation of its projects for new platforms. It will also grow its in-house training and development program, designed to help develop a new class of audio producers, and will expand its branded content division, Gimlet Creative.

"This investment is a gratifying validation that we are at the beginning of our second golden age of audio," Blumberg and Lieber said in a joint statement. "We'll use it to continue expanding the definition of what on-demand audio can be. We're excited about what we'll make, and we think others will be as well."

With this most recent series B round, Gimlet has raised a total of $22 million to date.