Fixed - Dvdplay Funding

The funds were earmarked for one thing: . DVDPlay ordered 500 new kiosks from a manufacturer in Ohio. They hired 50 part-time “route drivers” to restock discs. By Christmas 2006, they had 600 kiosks in 19 states. Revenue hit $8 million. Losses hit $2.1 million.

“We didn’t know what venture capital was,” Mark Phillips told a local business journal in 2007. “We just knew that Blockbuster had late fees, and people hated them.”

In the annals of forgotten tech, few artifacts feel as abruptly obsolete as the DVD rental kiosk. But in 2005, as Netflix was still a mail-order service and streaming was a buffering punchline, the battle for the $7 billion home-video market moved to the parking lots of America. Two names emerged: Redbox, backed by the deep pockets of Coinstar and McDonald’s, and DVDPlay, a plucky, privately held competitor from Portland, Oregon. dvdplay funding

“We wrote the check because DVDPlay had the best software stack,” recalls a former Voyager associate (speaking anonymously). “Redbox machines required a dedicated phone line. DVDPlay used cellular modems. That was the edge.”

| Round | Year | Amount | Lead Investor | Notable Terms | Outcome | |-------|------|--------|---------------|----------------|---------| | Series A | 2006 | $4.5M | Voyager Capital | Full ratchet, board seat | Burned for expansion | | Mezzanine debt | 2008 | $3.0M | Wellington Financial | 14.5% interest, convertible | Defaulted | | Studio rev-share | 2008 | $2.0M (imputed) | Lionsgate/Warner | 15% of revenue | Raised COGS to 47% | | Series B | 2009 | $12.0M | Oak Investment | 2x liquidation pref, pay-to-play | Lost on streaming pivot | | Convertible notes | 2011 | $2.5M | Portland angels | 20% discount, $0.25 floor | Converted to zero | | | | $24.0M | | | Recovery: $3.1M | The funds were earmarked for one thing:

In January 2012, DVDPlay filed for Chapter 7 liquidation. Total capital raised across all rounds and debt: . Total recovered for secured creditors: $3.1 million (mostly from selling kiosks for scrap metal and disc inventory to a liquidator in Texas). Unsecured creditors, including the Oregon drivers who had been paid in stock options, received nothing. Epilogue: What the Funding Bought (and What It Didn’t) The DVDPlay story is a textbook case of misaligned funding cycles . They raised equity when they needed debt, debt when they needed a strategic partner, and a growth round when they needed an exit.

The funding had bought growth, but not profitability. By 2008, the financial crisis was freezing VC wallets. Redbox, backed by McDonald’s real estate and Coinstar’s cash flow, dropped rental prices to $0.50 for a limited time. DVDPlay’s average revenue per kiosk fell from $1,100/month to $600/month. By Christmas 2006, they had 600 kiosks in 19 states

DVDPlay’s story is not one of technology or consumer habit. It is a story of —of desperate rounds, convertible notes, and the brutal math that happens when you try to out-spend a giant selling dollar bills for ninety cents. This is the anatomy of a capital war. Act I: The Bootstrap Years (2002–2005) Long before the kiosk wars, DVDPlay was the side project of Mark and Sharon Phillips, two serial entrepreneurs who had made a small fortune in the Oregon wine distribution business. Their first machine—a clunky, beige box that held 300 discs and required a customer to swipe a credit card and manually return the DVD to a slot—was funded with $80,000 of their own savings.