Nelson’s investment in Kwarter, a second screen company

What’s social TV? This is a question I addressed during a discussion with Nelson Chu, a managing director of Kinetic Ventures, an Atlanta- and Washington DC-based VC firm.

I/ Presentation of Kwarter

Nelson has recently invested in Kwarter, a company that offers a gaming application for second screens. Today, when consumers watch TV, they always have their phone or their tablet at hand: these are referred to as “second screens.”  When their favorite TV show is interrupted by ads, consumers flock to their devices, their second screens, to be entertained, thereby disregarding ads. Thus, advertisers, who pay hefty sums to broadcast ads, suffer from diminished viewer attention. This decreases the promotional value of ads.

To address this problem, Nelson is working with Kwarter. Kwarter is developing an application platform that provides entertainment content that’s related to the show the consumer is watching on TV. For example, let’s assume that the consumer is watching a sports event. On a second screen, there’s a game synchronized with the sport the consumer is watching on the TV.

Kwarter has shown that this kind of innovation can dramatically improve what consumers recall. When advertisers associate themselves with a game, consumers are not only informed of the ad but also actively engage with the promoted brand. This creates a much more intimate relationship with consumers.

II/ Nelson’s investment in Kwarter : Medium to long term goals

Ideally, Kwarter would like to capture significant viewership across a wide variety of TV genres.  The Company’s immediate goal is to capture significant engagement in sports, and they are well positioned to do so via key partnerships such as those it has inked in the areas of World Cup Soccer and in North American Football.. Reaching these goals means investing in additional servers, improving infrastructure and scaling. Start-ups start making real money when they scale, that is when they’re able to keep their fixed costs down, while at the same time, attracting more users.

The hope is to embed Kwarter’s technology in a wide variety of TV-related applications across numerous genres: this would allow for a seamless transition from one application to another.

Further readings:

• For a presentation of Kwarter, please click here and here
• For a presentation of Cardlytics, another company Nelson has invested in, please click here
• For a presentation of Kwarter by its founders, please refer here
• For a description of Kwarter in French please click here, for a description of Kwarter in English, please refer here
• For a comprehensive curation of social TV, please refer here