Yash Raj Films Places First Vertical Entertainment Bet on Rusk Media

Yash Raj Films has made a strategic investment in Rusk Media, marking the Bollywood studio’s first formal bet on India’s vertical entertainment market. Financial terms weren’t disclosed. The partnership gives YRF an entry into mobile-first storytelling at a moment when portrait-mode video is becoming its own content category.

Under the deal, YRF will oversee the creative direction of original animation and vertical micro-drama IP, while Rusk Media produces and distributes through its Alright! TV platform and global digital channels. The investment lands days after Rusk Media closed a Rs 100 crore Pre-Series C round led by Nazara Technologies, with InfoEdge Ventures, IvyCap Ventures, and an Audacity VC consortium also participating. Rusk Media CEO Mayank Yadav framed the partnership as a bid to convert mobile reach into enduring franchises, while YRF CEO Akshaye Widhani called it a natural extension of the studio’s vision.

YRF’s First Vertical Bet

The deal marks a strategic addition to YRF’s theatrical core. Films remain the studio’s heart, YRF Chief Executive Officer Akshaye Widhani said, framing the Rusk Media tie-up as a natural extension of YRF’s storytelling vision in the full comments he shared on the deal. YRF reported operating revenue of Rs 740 crore and a net profit of Rs 56 crore in FY24, per Acuité Ratings & Research, with the size of its Rusk Media investment terms undisclosed.

Under the partnership, YRF will oversee the creative direction of original animation and vertical micro-drama IP, while Rusk Media handles production and distribution through its proprietary Alright! TV platform and global digital channels. The collaboration targets Gen Z and Gen Alpha audiences in India and overseas. Rusk Media operates a full-stack digital entertainment business spanning social platforms, OTT services, and Alright! TV. The two companies will initially create new properties for the vertical format, not adapt YRF’s existing film franchises.

Vertical storytelling means videos designed for portrait-mode viewing on mobile phones. The category has grown alongside smartphone-led, short-form video habits among younger viewers. The business opportunity, per Yadav, lies in building repeatable franchises that travel across languages, platforms, and markets. Snackable one-offs are not the goal, he has said.

The Original-IP Rule

YRF and Rusk Media will start with original animation and vertical micro-drama IP. The studio’s theatrical library will not be adapted for vertical formats in this first phase, including its spy universe spanning ‘Pathaan,’ ‘War,’ and the ‘Tiger’ series. ‘Vertical storytelling has its own grammar and its own audience expectations,’ Widhani said. ‘Getting that right with original content is the priority.’

Variety reported the partnership as an exclusive, framing both CEOs in language that emphasised IP-building over chasing short-form trends. Yadav told Variety that Rusk brings ‘a native understanding of how digitally native audiences discover and build community around content,’ and with YRF’s backing is ‘building for longevity, not the algorithm.’ Widhani told the same outlet the studio’s aspiration with Rusk is ‘to build worlds, not just content.’

Rusk Media’s Rs 100 Crore War Chest

The YRF investment lands days after Rusk Media closed a Rs 100 crore Pre-Series C funding round led by Nazara Technologies. Existing investors InfoEdge Ventures and IvyCap Ventures also participated, alongside a consortium led by Audacity VC. Nazara Technologies Managing Director Nitish Mittersain and Audacity VC Managing Partner Kabir Kochhar will join Rusk Media’s board as part of the financing. Rusk Media has framed the new capital as the fuel for its next growth phase.

Rusk Media plans to deploy the new capital across content, creator-led entertainment, IP development, and the scale-up of its Alright! TV platform, with a stated focus on AI-driven production tools. Yadav framed the round as positioning the company ‘to sustain our growth and go truly global,’ pointing to Alright! TV, sports, and audio news as the formats being expanded. Mittersain singled out ‘strong youth-led IP, a fast-scaling B2C platform in Alright! TV, and a disciplined, technology-first approach to production’ as the building blocks that drew Nazara in.

• Nazara Technologies led the Rs 100 crore round; Managing Director Nitish Mittersain will join Rusk Media’s board.
• InfoEdge Ventures, an existing investor; Partner Amit Behl cited Rusk’s ‘culturally resonant, mobile-first content for Gen Z audiences.’
• IvyCap Ventures, an existing investor; Founder Vikram Gupta called Rusk ‘uniquely’ positioned at the intersection of content, technology, and audience engagement.
• Audacity VC led the participating consortium; Managing Partner Kabir Kochhar said Rusk’s ‘understanding of the future of media consumption and monetization has been light years ahead of most traditional media operators.’

With Nazara and Audacity representatives taking board seats, the strategic oversight of Rusk Media is broadening alongside its capital base. The fresh capital will fund content portfolio expansion, Alright! TV scaling, and the build-out of AI-powered production tools. Yadav’s stated goal is to build ‘world-class entertainment infrastructure from India for the world.’ The board additions cement a year of momentum for the company, with the partnership with YRF now layered onto that expanded backing.

The Reach That Already Exists

YRF and Rusk Media are stepping in at a moment when the category already has scale but few lasting franchises to show for it. The 2025 interactive media findings from Lumikai size the micro-drama segment at $300 million in its first year of meaningful traction. Lumikai projects 91% growth in 2026 and a $4.5 billion market by 2030.

• $300 million: India’s micro-drama market size in its first year of meaningful scale (Lumikai 2025).
• $4.5 billion: projected market size by 2030 (Lumikai 2025).
• 91%: expected growth in 2026 (Lumikai 2025).
• 450 million: cumulative micro-drama downloads across Indian platforms.
• 100 million: monthly active micro-drama users in India.

The broader interactive media market in India is worth $13.8 billion and grew 17% year-on-year across video, social, games, animation and VFX, and audio. That growth is running through 877 million smartphone users in the country, per Lumikai. Micro-dramas are framed by Lumikai as ‘the new OTT,’ generating more revenue in their first year than most OTT platforms managed in their first three. AI production tools are cutting animation and VFX timelines by 30-50%, a shift that lets Indian studios move from cost-arbitrage work to IP-led competition.

YRF is not alone among legacy studios eyeing the format. Kuku Technologies and Balaji Telefilms are also investing heavily in micro-drama production, per industry analysis. The Hindi and vernacular micro-drama segment is growing at approximately 60% annually, by the same estimates.

The category’s distinctive shape is what made it attractive to YRF in the first place. Mobile-first consumption has grown with smartphone-led, short-form video habits among younger viewers, and YRF wants to meet them on the device they already use. Widhani called vertical storytelling a category with its own grammar and audience expectations, not a casual side project. Rusk Media’s pitch, in Yadav’s Variety remarks, is that it brings a native understanding of how digitally native audiences discover and build community around content.

377 Million Mobile-First Viewers, One Theatrical Studio

Widhani’s stated reason for moving now is audience behaviour, not a strategic reorientation. ‘The world’s best studios evolve with changing audience behaviours,’ he said, framing the partnership as evolution. India has a 377-million-strong mobile-first audience, by Widhani’s framing, and that is the pool the studio wants to serve.

YRF’s broader digital ambitions stretch well beyond this Rusk Media deal. YRF Entertainment, the studio’s digital content division, has already produced a four-part Netflix miniseries, ‘The Railway Men,’ set against the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy. Its second Netflix series, the mythological crime thriller ‘Mandala Murders’ starring Vaani Kapoor, premiered last year. The Rusk Media deal is layered onto that wider digital strategy.

The studio’s next theatrical release is ‘Alpha,’ a female-led entry in the YRF spy universe starring Alia Bhatt and Sharvari alongside Anil Kapoor and Bobby Deol, set for theatrical release on July 3 and directed by Shiv Rawail. Hollywood studios are running a parallel microdrama push, with Fox, Peacock, and Telemundo funding 1-to-3-minute vertical series in a market Omdia sizes at $14 billion by year-end 2026. The vertical move sits alongside YRF’s theatrical pipeline, not inside it.

What Has to Land in Three to Five Years

Widhani set a specific yardstick for the partnership in his comments. Over the next three to five years, the test is whether Rusk Media builds category-defining properties that carry Indian storytelling to global digital audiences. The undisclosed deal size makes execution, not price, the public scoreboard. Both CEOs framed the deal as a deliberate attempt to close the gap between scale and lasting IP.

Vertical entertainment in India has produced extraordinary reach, but not the enduring IP that defines a category. That is the gap this collaboration is designed to close.

Mayank Yadav, co-founder and chief executive of Rusk Media, said this in comments shared with Variety, and framed the collaboration’s job as converting micro-drama reach into franchises that travel across languages, platforms, and years. Widhani separately called platforms ‘infrastructure’ and content ‘culture,’ and described the partnership as an exercise in building worlds. The format has yet to produce a franchise library at scale, and Rusk’s mobile-first reach plus YRF’s production muscle will now be measured by whether that gap closes.

Frequently Asked Questions

What did YRF invest in Rusk Media?

Yash Raj Films has made a strategic investment in Rusk Media, the digital-first entertainment company behind the Alright! TV platform. Financial terms were not disclosed. Under the partnership, YRF oversees creative direction for original animation and vertical micro-drama IP, while Rusk Media handles production and distribution through Alright! TV and global digital channels.

Why did YRF choose Rusk Media?

YRF CEO Akshaye Widhani cited India’s 377-million-strong mobile-first audience and Rusk Media’s native understanding of how Gen Z and Gen Alpha audiences discover and consume content. Rusk Media had just closed a Rs 100 crore Pre-Series C funding round led by Nazara Technologies, with InfoEdge Ventures, IvyCap Ventures, and an Audacity VC consortium also participating.

How big is India’s vertical entertainment market?

The micro-drama segment in India generated $300 million in its first year of meaningful scale, per Lumikai’s 2025 State of India Interactive Media report. Lumikai projects 91% growth in 2026 and a $4.5 billion market by 2030. The category has recorded 450 million cumulative downloads and 100 million monthly active users across Indian platforms.

Will YRF adapt its existing franchises for the vertical format?

No. The partnership will initially focus on creating original IP for vertical storytelling. YRF’s existing theatrical franchises, including its spy universe spanning ‘Pathaan,’ ‘War,’ and the ‘Tiger’ series, are not being adapted for vertical formats in this first phase. Widhani said vertical storytelling has its own grammar and audience expectations that need to be developed from scratch.

Who are Rusk Media’s investors?

The Rs 100 crore Pre-Series C round was led by Nazara Technologies, with participation from existing investors InfoEdge Ventures and IvyCap Ventures alongside a consortium led by Audacity VC. Nazara Technologies Managing Director Nitish Mittersain and Audacity VC Managing Partner Kabir Kochhar joined Rusk Media’s board as part of the financing.