Digital sports broadcast network VEQTA raises $500,000 in seed funding

It wants to redefine how sports is consumed in India by serving fans a selection of the best sports content

VEQTA, which claims to be India’s first over-the-top (OTT) digital broadcast network dedicated to sports, on Thursday announced $500,000 in seed round funding from early stage venture capital firm Chatsworth Management and ITW, India’s leading sports management company. The venture had earlier received initial stage backing from ITW.

VEQTA aims at redefining how sports is consumed in India by serving fans a selection of the best sports content from across the globe through video-on-demand and live streaming.

The company will be launching its flagship OTT service in the next few weeks to engage sports fans across India.

Vikram Tanwar, co-founder of VEQTA, said: “VEQTA is a unique offering that covers a wide variety of sports in innovative content formats and will expand to multiple languages in the future. As a dedicated sports network, we will follow a ‘Freemium’ model with a large pool of content available to all users and selected premium content behind a paywall.This will include licensed content and also our flagship studio content across cricket, football, action sports, motorsports, basketball, tennis, badminton and a wide range of Olympic sports. VEQTA will be a destination for sports fans to enjoy unmatched width & depth in content coming from the biggest names in the business."

“VEQTA has a highly experienced and passionate team that is deeply entrenched in the sports business and understands best the evolving needs of young consumers in India," said Gaurav Gill, managing partner, Chatsworth Management.

He added: "The OTT service space for streaming and video-on-demand is one of the fastest growing spaces for digital businesses.There are offerings in the movies, general entertainment, and music genres, however, sports is highly under-served in India unlike other markets in the west, where it is one of the largest segments. VEQTA, with its highly innovative offering, will change that as the new home of sports for fans in the country."