Japan-based Rakuten, an electronic commerce, internet services and digital media content company, is on an ambitious path to one day go neck and neck with Amazon and Lovefilm subsidiary, Netflix. Its recent acquisition of Singapore-based Viki.com, a crowd-sourcing multi-lingual video streaming company, is likely to give it the global edge it needs to build scale. The Japanese company is reportedly set to pay close to $200m for Viki, according to media sources.
Rakuten, a Japanese e-commerce company that is building its war chest with e-book and digital media acquisitions over the past year, has reportedly agreed to acquire Viki, a Singapore-based global video streaming platform that crowd-sources translated subtitles. While financial details of the acquisition have not been made public, several media sources are reporting the deal is valued close to $200m.
Rakuten is no stranger to hefty acquisition targets having spent $1.6bn on acquisitions over the past five years. One of…
