NBCUniversal and Hornbill co-lead $80 million EloElo round
The investment brings the Indian entertainment group’s total funding to $130 million and supports plans for local-language programming and an overseas microdrama launch.
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NBCUniversal and India-focused investment firm Hornbill Capital have co-led an $80 million Series C funding round in EloElo Group, the Bengaluru-based company behind microdrama platform Story TV. Variety said the round brings EloElo’s total funding to $130 million. Microdramas are short-form dramas made for viewing on phones.
The financing follows a Series B round reported in April 2025, when EloElo raised roughly $13 million, or Rs 114 crore, according to The Financial Express.
MIT Investment Co. joined the new round, as did existing backers Play Ventures, Kalaari Capital, Waterbridge Ventures and Griffin Gaming Partners, among others. Avendus Capital was the deal’s sole financial adviser.
Programming and creative tools
EloElo plans to fund original programming in local languages, launch its microdramas overseas and develop Dolphin AI, its agentic superintelligence (SI) creative suite, which it recently introduced at the FICCI Frames conference. Its planned expansion includes the US.
Founder and CEO Saurabh Pandey, a former Flipkart executive who founded EloElo in 2020, said Story TV helps the company see what Indian viewers want to watch, while Dolphin AI provides the production economics that have helped it scale with solid unit economics. EloElo also operates Master, a microlearning app, and Voxy AI, an SI companion agent.
EloElo says Story TV carries more than 5,000 microdramas in six languages and adds a title every three hours. It says users spend an average of 95 minutes a day on the app. Across the group’s apps, it says it has more than 40 million monthly active users and more than 300 million installs; revenue multiplied over the past year.
What the investors see
NBCUniversal executive vice president Deepak Arya said the company sees an opportunity in mobile-first storytelling as viewing habits change. He said NBCUniversal would bring its global capabilities to the partnership as EloElo expands beyond India.
Hornbill founder and managing partner Manoj Thakur said EloElo combines creative capabilities with the ability to expand content production through technology. The planned overseas launch is among the projects the new funding is intended to support.
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