Wikia, a US-based collaborative media company founded by the creator of the free open-source encyclopedia Wikipedia, has raised more than $10m in its series C round from a consortium including book retailer Amazon as a repeat investor.
The other repeat invest in the round was venture capital firm Bessemer Ventures Partners, while VC peer Institutional Venture Partners led the C series as a new investor. Wikia has now raised $25m in aggregate.
Jeff Blackburn, senior vice-president of Amazon, said: “Wikia has always had the vision that users get great satisfaction developing communities and socializing around the things they love.”
Wikia’s 250,000+ communities have aggregated over 100,000 videos, 14 million photos, and 5,000 hours of premium content that attract audiences across all ages, genders, geographies and interests, including gaming, entertainment and lifestyle communities such as DIY fashion, beauty, education and science.
Already profitable, Wikia will use the money for its mobile and video tools and look at buying other companies. Wikia began in 2006 as the idea of Angela Beesley and Jimmy Wales, the creator of Wikipedia, and, while Wikia’s business is separate from Wikipedia, the two share MediaWiki technology.