Comcast Making $200 Million Investment in Vox Media

The company has high hopes for the future of online media.

Vox Media now has a big investor in Comcast's NBCUniversal.

Vox Media now has a big investor in Comcast’s NBCUniversal.

There’s no doubt that Comcast has high hopes for online media. The company’s NBCUniversal subsidiary has invested $200 million in Vox Media.

The deal gives Comcast and NBCU interest in a diversified online media business with brands like SB Nation, Polygon, The VergeVox.com, Eater, Racked, Curbed, and Re/code. It should help Comcast extend its reach with younger, more online-driven audiences.

It comes just two weeks after reports surfaced that Comcast will invest $250 million in BuzzFeed. Comcast’s motivation for that deal seems like a no-brainer: BuzzFeed had revenues of $100 million in 2014 and boasts 1 billion monthly video views and 200 million site visitors per month.

NBCUniversal joins Accel Partners, Comcast Ventures, Khosla Ventures and General Atlantic as Vox investors.

“Vox Media has a great portfolio of premium digital brands that deeply engage broad audiences,” said Steve Burke, CEO of NBCUniversal in a statement. “Vox Media has strong leadership, top editorial talent and a unique technology platform. We are excited to be making this investment and building a collaborative partnership involving editorial content, advertising and technology.”

Re/code reports that the deal with NBCUniversal values Vox Media at more than $1 billion, after it raised approximately $300 million. Re/code says that we can expect an announcement regarding the NBCU-BuzzFeed deal later this week.