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Audio Series Platform Pocket FM Completes First ESOP Buyback Worth USD 8.3 Mn The buyback of stock comes shortly after the Bengaluru-based company announced its USD 103 million Series D funding led by Lightspeed.

By Paromita Gupta

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[L-R] Prateek Dixit, Rohan Nayak and Nishant S, Co-founders of Pocket FM

Audio entertainment platform Pocket FM announced that it has completed its first ESOP (employee stock ownership plan) buyback worth USD 8.3 million. The buyback of stock comes shortly after the Bengaluru-based company announced its USD 103 million Series D funding led by Lightspeed.

According to the official release, PocketFM's current and ex-employees, holding vested stocks in the company, participated in this process.

Rohan Nayak, Co-founder and CEO of Pocket FM, said, "Despite the challenging economic conditions, we remain unwavering in offering opportunities for wealth creation and fostering a culture of growth."

"As we continue our journey of entertaining people worldwide, we will keep pushing boundaries, innovating relentlessly and striving for excellence together," Nayak added.

Founded in 2018 by Rohan Nayak, Nishant S and Prateek Dixit, Pocket FM provides podcasts and other content in Bengali, Tamil, Hindi, and other regional languages.

The platform claims to have over 100,000 hours of content, including 2,000+ exclusive audio series and more than 400,000 episodes across genres and languages.

An online reading platform called Pocket Novel, which links Indian authors with readers, was introduced by Pocket FM in February of this year.

The company said in a statement that it has surpassed USD 150 million ARR, and is growing at 57% QoQ.

Paromita Gupta

Entrepreneur Staff

Features Writer with Entrepreneur India

Covering news and trends in AI and Metaverse segments. An avid book reader running her personal blog on the side. You may reach me at paromita@entrepreneurindia.com. 
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