Aereo Closes On $34 Million In New Funding

Aereo, and its backers, are clearly banking on the legal system giving it a green light.

Aereo CEO Chet Kanoja will be announcing Wednesday that the company has closed on $34 million in additional funding for the roll out of its online TV programming delivery service.

Broadcasters have taken Aereo to court, arguing it is retransmitting its TV station signals without payment in violation of copyright. Aereo says it is providing remote access to the free over-the-air antennas and recording functions its subs are entitled to.

Among those putting additional money into the service in the latest round of financing were Barry Diller's IAC, Highland Capital Partners, FirstMark and others, as well as new investors Gordon Crawford and Himalaya Capital Management.

Kanoja will announce the completion of the Series C financing round at the Citi Global Internet Media & Telecommunications Conference in Las Vegas.

He plans to tell the conference that the money will help Aereo continue in expansion mode. He points out that at this time last year, Aereo was only in New York, but today it is in 10 markets with plans to be in 15 markets by the end of the first quarter.

"Aereo has scaled very quickly in 365 days and this additional funding will allow us to maintain this rapid pace of growth," he said.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.