Yaap acquires Brand Planet for $3 million, plans global expansion
Digital content company Yaap Digital has acquired Brand Planet Consultants for $3 million.
Post-acquisition, Brand Planet will be rebranded as Yaap. The deal will help Yaap with its global expansion plan.
Pune-based Brand Planet Consultants is a strategic branding and design company, which was founded in 2008. Till recently, the firm was known as Elephant Delhi- the North Indian operations of Elephant Design.
Since its inception, Brand Planet has established itself in the area of branding and specialist design services in NCR. Brand Planet is currently engaged with blue chip clientele like The Coca Cola Company, Mrs Bector’s Foods, Mahindra Comviva, Godfrey Phillips India, SBI Cards, Hero Cycles, PI Industries and LT Foods in Delhi NCR.
Among the other brands that the company has already helped to build are BlaBlaCar and Paper Boats. Brand Planet has been involved with key strategic initiatives like corporate brand definition, identity development, packaging design for new and re-branding FMCG companies, B2B and B2E communications, retail and POSM development, besides pure-play brand consulting initiatives, including market entry strategy, brand positioning, portfolio management advisory, and corporate visioning and identity.
Anjan Roy, Director, Brand Planet said,
Brand Planet and Yaap have a common goal of deepening the connection with consumers. We believe that consumer intimacy has always been the secret to building powerful brands. The specialisation of brand building and technology coming together is a platform for brands, companies and institutions to become powerful and develop deep stakeholder relationships.
Yaap’s launch and funding
Yaap, which was launched earlier this year, had secured $5 million in investment from Rainmaker Ventures, which they utilised for the expansion of their team and acquisitions.
Yaap’s platform helps its clients focus on the three digital content service lines of Design, Discovery and Distribution. It takes care of a company’s entire content management process and generates content in bulk, which brings down the cost of the entire process.
The company currently has teams in Delhi and Mumbai, but remotely serves customers pan-India. Its clients include Startup India, ITC Hotels, and Maharaja Whiteline, among others.
Acquisitions and content management sector
The Indian startup ecosystem has been abuzz with acquisitions and consolidations this year. With the freeze in funding, or rather the stringent flow of investments, the rules of the game have changed for startups, and with this grim scenario, the number of consolidations will likely soar.
Though the aforementioned sector is quite mature in the US and is said to be a $40 billion industry, in India, it is still at a very nascent stage. The significant players in this space includes Bengaluru-based Deucetech Solutions, Devak Infomark and Content Axis.
