- Unlimited reading subscription service Scribd announced that it has raised $58 million in funding led by Spectrum Equity
Scribd — an unlimited reading subscription service that provides access to books, audiobooks, documents, etc. — announced that it has raised $58 million in funding led by Spectrum Equity. This round of funding will be used for supporting the growth and product innovation, enhancing operations, and further changing the way the world reads.
Scribd hit several major milestones in the past couple of years, including 1 million paying subscribers, the launch of localized for international markets, and nearly doubling its employee base.
The company also expanded its footprint with offices in San Francisco, New York, Phoenix, Toronto, and Amsterdam. And to prepare for additional growth, Scribd bolstered the company’s executive team by hiring Jared Fliesler as Chief Operating Officer in 2018 and Tony Grimminck earlier this year.
“We’re excited to partner with Spectrum Equity, a firm with deep expertise in high growth subscription businesses, as we prepare for the future,” said Scribd founder and CEO Trip Adler. “By partnering with the world’s best publishers of all types of content, Scribd has introduced a first-of-its-kind experience for readers, while unlocking a new revenue stream for the publishing community. This funding will enable us to continue to operate sustainably and efficiently while accelerating our growth, product innovations, content acquisition and continued investment in our employees.”
Launched in 2007, Scribd rolled out its reading subscription service in 2013. And now more than 100 million unique visitors come to Scribd every month and readers have spent a total of over 190 million hours reading on the platform.
“As a differentiated content library, including robust user-generated content and ebooks and audiobooks from top tier publishers, Scribd is poised to be the leading online subscription reading service for consumers across the globe. Spectrum has been fortunate to be a part of successfully scaling several digital content businesses, and we look forward to partnering with Trip and the entire management team to help make Scribd a part of readers’ everyday lives,” added Spectrum Equity managing director Pete Jensen.
