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Pocket Entertainment launches AI-powered comics platform, Pocket Toons

The company is leveraging AI to produce content 20x faster at a third of the cost, making high-quality comics more accessible than ever

Rohan Nayak, co-founder and chief executive officer of Pocket Entertainment, Shreyas Joshi, senior vice-president of Pocket Toons

Peerzada Abrar Bengaluru

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Pocket Entertainment, the newly restructured parent company of Pocket FM and Pocket Novel, has unveiled Pocket Toons, an artificial intelligence-first comics platform that leverages AI to transform storytelling and content creation.
 
Since its beta launch in January 2025, Pocket Toons has gained rapid traction, already hosting over 30 comic titles and achieving strong product-market fit, with users engaging for an average of 60 minutes daily.
 
To accelerate its next phase of growth, Pocket Entertainment has committed $15 million in 2025 to scale up Pocket Toons and is targeting $100 million in annualised revenue run rate (ARR) by 2026.
 
 
Rohan Nayak, co-founder and chief executive officer of Pocket Entertainment, said the fusion of AI and human storytelling marks the beginning of a new creative era. He said that historically, every major evolution in entertainment—be it cinema, animation, or digital streaming—has been driven by technology.
 
At Pocket Entertainment, Nayak said the company is harnessing AI to amplify human creativity—empowering artists to push the boundaries of storytelling without replacing their unique artistic expression.
 
“By integrating AI into the creative workflow, we are not just increasing efficiency—we are unlocking new possibilities for storytelling at an unprecedented scale,” said Nayak.
 
At the core of Pocket Toons lies Blaze!, an AI-powered studio transforming the way artists and writers create. Designed to enhance creativity, Blaze! empowers creators to produce high-quality, episodic content 20 times faster than industry standards—all while slashing production costs to just a third of the usual.
 
It automates complex processes such as background rendering, scene composition, colouring, and quality control, allowing artists to focus on storytelling and character development rather than production bottlenecks. With Blaze!, Pocket Toons has redefined content production, releasing three episodes per day for a comic— a game-changer in an industry where the norm is just one per week. This represents a 20-times improvement in speed at one-third the cost.
 
“We are producing content 20x faster at a third of the cost, making high-quality comics more accessible than ever,” said Shreyas Joshi, senior vice-president of Pocket Toons. “Pocket Toons is not about replacing human creativity—it’s about enhancing it. As we look ahead, AI-driven platforms like ours will be instrumental in shaping the future of entertainment, bridging the gap between artistic ambition and scalable production.”
 
Paying users are spending over two hours daily on Pocket Toons. The total reading time on the platform has surpassed six million minutes during the beta phase. Total downloads have crossed 100,000 in the last two weeks.
 
For Pocket Toons, AI curates and recommends content tailored to user preferences, enhancing reader retention and satisfaction. It enables the exploration of new storytelling formats, including interactive comics and immersive genres. AI-powered analytics help identify key markets and adapt content for diverse cultural and linguistic audiences.
 
“With its proprietary AI-powered studio, Blaze!, Pocket Toons is setting new benchmarks in the comics industry—redefining storytelling by blending human creativity with AI-driven efficiency,” said Harsha Kumar, partner at Lightspeed. “As one of our portfolio companies, Pocket FM continues to push the boundaries of innovation, proving that India is at the forefront of shaping the future of global entertainment.”
 
The global comics industry is undergoing rapid transformation. Valued at $8.63 billion in 2023, the comics market has been expanding at an annual growth rate of 7.8 per cent since 2018. By 2028, projections estimate it will reach $11.39 billion, with a further increase to $15.38 billion by 2033. This momentum is fuelled by AI-powered content creation, increasing digital adoption, and the rise of mobile-first reading experiences.

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First Published: Feb 18 2025 | 7:54 PM IST

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