Whip Media Group, looking to localize content for global audiences, said it has made a deal to work with Zoo Digital, which will provide cloud-based dubbing, subtitling and distribution services.

Zoo Digital will integrate with Whip Media’s Content Value Management Platform, enabling clients to license their content in new international markets. 

Whip Media’s Strategic Supply Chain Partnership helps both buyers and sellers of content put their content everywhere it needs to be. Amid the streaming wars and the fast-growing pace of media consumption, Whip is prioritizing a frictionless distribution ecosystem with transparency and monitoring.

“As the amount of streaming content available has grown and spread to more global markets, so has the need for multilingual subtitle and dubbing services to bring TV shows and movies to audiences in more languages faster,” said Cory Sher, VP of global sales & business development, Whip Media Group. “We’re thrilled to partner with ZOO Digital and provide to our clients the ability to more efficiently localize their new and catalog content and grow their audiences worldwide.”

Zoo Digital uses more than 7,200 native translators to provide subtitles and captions in over 80 languages.

“We are very excited to partner with a company so closely aligned with our own digital strategy. We quickly identified a seamless workflow with Whip Media which will provide full transparency on localization order management for their global client portfolio,” said Mazin Al-Jumaili, director business development EMEA, at Zoo Digital. “As worldwide OTT platforms build momentum in local content publishing, both companies are perfectly positioned to offer a global supply chain solution.” 

Deluxe Entertainment Services Group has inked a deal to acquire Sfera, the company behind a  globally-focused, cloud-based localization platform.

The deal, which includes Sfera Studios and Sfera Labs, will bolster Deluxe Localization, a new division of Deluxe, the company said.

Deluxe said it made the deal as studios and other content producers continue to distribute movies and TV shows on a global basis, which likewise has driven demand for scalable, high-quality localization services.

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Deluxe said the addition of Sfera will pave the way for a platform with thousands of translators covering 50-plus languages across 75 countries.

Early on, Deluxe Localization will use Sfera’s technology and platform to enable asset management, workflow and translation management, automated quality control (QC), and real-time analytics for services. Those include subtitling in 50-plus languages, accessibility services (including closed captioning, subtitles and audio descriptions), material ingest (including watermarking), metadata conformance and quality control.

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Sfera founder and CEO Morgan Fiumi will assume the newly-created role of chief innovation officer of Deluxe.  The new Deluxe Localization Division is being led by Derek McKellar, former head of global language services at Google. Both will report to Deluxe CEO John Wallace.

“We created Deluxe Localization together with Sfera to make sure our clients have the kind of capacity, capability, and state-of-the-art technology that just wasn’t present in the industry, and is absolutely required to reach worldwide audiences,” John Wallace, CEO of Deluxe, said in a statement. “The Sfera cloud platform lets us harness our global workforce and the data generated across our businesses to build more efficient operations capable of serving the growing appetite for content around the world.”

Santa Monica, Calif.-based Sfera was founded in 2011.