REV Asia acquires stake in Chinese social news portal

• TanTanNews focuses on entertainment, travel, fashion, and lifestyle
• Recorded 2.8 million page views and one million users in November 2018

MEDIA Prima Digital Sdn Bhd announced on Jan 2 that its wholly-owned subsidiary, REV Asia Holdings Sdn Bhd, has acquired a 25% stake in Monster Scape Sdn Bhd, the owner and publisher of Chinese social news portal TanTanNews (www.tantannews.com).

As part of the deal, REV Asia will be representing the online news portal as the exclusive advertising reselling partner.

TanTanNews is a Chinese language social news media and content portal that primarily focuses on the latest news and trendiest stories on entertainment, travel, fashion, and lifestyle.

Launched in 2013, it has grown into a prominent brand and source for many visitors from Malaysia and across the region.

According to Google Analytics, TanTanNews recorded a total of 2.8 million page views and one million users in November 2018.

TanTanNews founder Sean Teoh, said: “Joining Malaysia's largest media group will enable us to help more advertisers reach out to our audience, while we can also leverage on Media Prima Digital's platforms to build more creative content. This partnership will also allow us to focus on our technology for building more innovative products to serve all users across Media Prima Digital and TanTanNews."

REV Asia managing director Voon Tze Khay, said: “The acquisition of TanTanNews will further strengthen REV Asia’s dominant position in the millennial Chinese-speaking online community, and enable us to expand to users in the social news and entertainment segments.

“As the pioneer and leader in providing sponsored content solutions to advertisers in Malaysia, the addition of TanTanNews will allow REV Asia to scale at a rapid pace in helping potential advertisers reach out to the younger Chinese market inclined to reading news content.

“In addition to sponsored content, REV Asia will also extend its small and medium enterprise content offerings to TanTanNews.”

Media Prima Digital chief executive officer Rafiq Razali, said: “We are excited to welcome TanTanNews to our Chinese language network. We are confident that this will solidify Media Prima Group’s position as the largest local digital media company in Malaysia as there is a huge demand for Chinese-language content from our audiences and advertisers.

“Given the popularity of TanTanNews among Chinese millennials and REV Asia’s expertise in providing sponsored content solutions, we see this as a sustainable solution to generate greater revenue.

“We have also recently introduced digital ads re-targeting via sponsored content, which will be extended to our Chinese language network. Moving forward, we will continue to look out for strategic acquisitions and partnerships that will drive growth for the Group in the digital segment, as well as complement our core businesses,” added Rafiq.

REV Asia — one of Southeast Asia’s largest digital media companies with a combined following of 8.4 million average unique visitors according to Google Analytics — has an extensive portfolio of popular online brands which include SAYS, OhBula!, RojakLah, Viral Cham, 8coin, Sirap Limau, MyResipi, Kongsi Resepi, JUICE, and its most recent addition, Mashable Southeast Asia.

Media Prima’s digital revenue increased to RM64.3 million for the nine months financial period ended Sept 30, 2018 (9MFY18) from RM28 million in the comparative period (9MFY17).

This reflects the positive progress of the Media Prima’s business transformation plan, driven by strategies which include accelerating digital advertising revenue and monetisation opportunities.