Work We Do

Portal-A

PORTAL A is an award-winning branded and original content company. The company’s accolades include being named Agency of the Year by The Streamys, Video Agency of the Year by Digiday, and a Top 20 Content Creator by AdWeek. Its clients include Google, Amazon, Target, Disney, MLB, and Snapchat. The company’s founders engaged RockWater to evaluate both its existing and new planned business lines within branded and original content. The strategy assignment resulted in a new investment and resource plan, to help drive revenue growth and accelerate new market entry.

RockWater was a great executive ally. They took time to understand our growth needs, created a custom workplan, and executed with precision. Their recommendations were data-based and actionable, and are now part of our operating plan. RockWater also brought good energy to our org, which helped get team buy-in. We look forward to working with them again.

Zach Blume, Co-Founder and President at Portal-A

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Zach Blume

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ViacomCBS

We specifically hired Chris and his team to support competitive landscape analysis, market intelligence and growth planning for branded ad sales solutions – as we better understood his broader capability set, we expanded our engagement to include new IP incubation ideas, IP valuation and more. I highly recommend RockWater to any client in need of sharp and actionable strategy advisory.

Thomas De Napoli, Sr. Director of Viacom Velocity

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Thomas De Napoli

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XL Media

XL Media (LSE: XLMedia PLC) is a global performance publisher. It combines the power of people, data-driven behavioral insight, and captivating editorial content to build valuable connections between brands and consumers.

When we began looking for intelligence partners, we knew we wanted a group who would work with us as part of a team, not a vendor. We found exactly what we were looking for in RockWater. Starting from a very open place, they were comfortable with and capable of helping us identify and focus on the most advantageous areas of business for the group. The research they deliver is consistently contextual, actionable and valuable in driving strategic decisions and growth.

Elizabeth Carter, VP of Marketing and Taylor Quist, Head of Global Brand Strategy

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Elizabeth Carter

Taylor Quist

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Team Coco / WarnerMedia

Team Coco is a digitally-native comedy brand, and a joint venture between Conan O’Brien and WarnerMedia. Entering 2020 Team Coco sought to capitalize on incredible revenue and M&A market momentum. Their executive leadership required advisory to define their growth strategy and execution plan, board communications, and buy-side M&A diligence and valuation.

In my role as COO of Team Coco, when we decided we needed help strategizing and plotting new growth initiatives, RockWater was the first call I made.

Adam Sachs, COO

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Adam Sachs

William Navarre

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FAO Schwarz

FAO Schwarz is the world’s most renowned specialty kids toy manufacturer and retailer. Since being founded over 160 years ago, the company has transformed into an omnichannel brand across brick & mortar, wholesale, and web and social commerce. The company is owned by ThreeSixty Group, which owns and operates 5+ global consumer brands including Vornado and Sharper Image.

To plan FAO’s digital transformation, we needed an expert team who understood how parents and kids are spending their time and money online, which is powering new direct-to-consumer business models for toy retailers. RockWater was a great bolt-on partner to us and facilitated outlining an exciting new growth strategy for FAO Schwarz.

Jan-Eric Kloth, President, International Sales, Retail, & Corporate Strategy at ThreeSixty Group

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Jan-Eric Kloth

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Whistle

Team Whistle – comprising Whistle, Tiny Horse, New Form Digital and Vertical Networks – is a global digital sports and entertainment company. Team Whistle creates and distributes engaging content experiences for today’s audiences, boasting over 4.2 billion monthly video views, 629 million total aggregated social audience, and 1600+ network channels.

Chris’s team delivered sharp decision-making frameworks and actionable market intelligence for our leadership. Their work significantly accelerated our go-forward planning and new product development

I regularly bounce new business ideas off Chris, as he has a great mind for sustainable value creation vs short term distractions in the media, tech and commerce industries. I look forward to working with him again

Michael Cohen, CEO

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Michael Cohen

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VERB Technology

VERB Technology Company, Inc. (NASDAQ: VERB) is rapidly emerging as the market leader in business-focused interactive video sales and marketing tools, including livestream ecommerce, CRM, and content management applications. With offices in California and Utah, VERB services clients in 60 countries and in 48 languages.

Founder and C-suite leadership sought market research, consumer and executive surveys, and go-to-market planning for a new livestream commerce product launch.

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Rory Cutaia

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Atmosphere

Atmosphere is a free multi-channel TV streaming service with content designed for businesses offering 51 original and partner TV channels. Atmosphere offers an incredibly powerful advertising medium where brands can develop contextualized advertising campaigns with highly targeted delivery by venue-type, geography, or content channel type. The platform was developed using proprietary content, technology, and data to deliver unparalleled experiences for businesses, consumers, and advertisers. The business was incubated within Chive Media Group and spun out in 2019.

Chris and the RockWater team gave us the exact leverage we were looking for in an advisor. The team brings deep industry perspective, thoughtful frameworks, and a strong network of relationships.

Mike Grisko, CFO

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Mike Grisko

Eric Spielman

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Red Seat Ventures

Red Seat Ventures partners with talent, brands, and influencers to fund, build, and operate unique businesses. Founder and executive leadership sought investment targets for a Content x Commerce investor roll-up strategy, optimization of their user acquisition “funnel” across 6+ digital channels, and an audience and marketing forecast model.

RockWater delivers something few others can: unique perspective. Chris and his team analyze the complicated playing field and cut through the BS to deliver actionable insights that add immediate value. RockWater acts as an extension of my own team, adding a tool to our toolbox at the exact moment we need it.

Chris Balfe, Founder & Partner

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Chris Balfe

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EffinFunny

EffinFunny is a full-service creative production company that makes award winning content targeted at the growing US born South Asian demographic. Their team has developed, created, and produced content for Comedy Central, FX, TBS, Red Hour, and ABC digital.

The company’s leadership tapped RockWater to research whitespace opportunities and develop the go-to-market plan to drive new revenues and grow enterprise value.

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Sandeep Parikh

Anand Shah

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Mattson

RockWater is an active collaborator with Mattson, a global food and CPG innovator behind brands like Popchips, Blue Bottle Cold Brew, White Castle, and Yogurtland. Together, RockWater and Mattson are bringing unique food & beverage commerce solutions to traditional and digital media partners ranging from publishers and celebrities to sports / esports leagues and franchises.

Chris and his team are not just collaborators, they’re visionaries. They see opportunities for clients that they don’t see themselves. We have ideated with RockWater, and think of them as a group of creatives, as well as strategists.

Barb Stuckey, President & Chief Innovation Officer

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Barb Stuckey

Katie Hagan

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FilmNation

FilmNation Entertainment, one of the world’s preeminent independent entertainment companies, sought to diversify and complement its core film and TV businesses by expanding into audio and digital, with the end goal of broadening its storytelling platform and driving additional enterprise value.

RockWater’s team dovetails incredibly sophisticated marketplace intelligence with an impressive, far-reaching network of leading professionals at nearly every top digital-focused company – with this powerful combination, they provide clients with invaluable strategic insights and guidance. Chris and the team helped us quickly identify and prioritize opportunity lanes for FilmNation as we expanded our global content platform into the digital space. We’d recommend them with the highest praise, in a heartbeat.

Milan Popelka, COO

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Milan Popelka

Alyssa Martino

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DWNLOAD Media

DWNLOAD is an audio aggregator who is rapidly acquiring small to medium size class independent podcast studios and networks, and rolling them all under one roof to create an independent audio juggernaut. RockWater is serving as DWNLOAD’s dedicated M&A team sourcing, assessing, and structuring all of its acquisitions.

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Chris Peterson

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CASHDROP

CASHDROP, launched in January 2020, is a cloud POS Company with a twist on the economic model. Merchants access full capabilities of the app for free, and CASHDROP charges the merchant’s end customer a 5% convenience fee. It aligns CASHDROP to remove as much friction as possible for the merchant, since they only make money when the merchant does.

CASHDROP has tapped RockWater numerous times to advise on its fundraising and M&A activities.

The crew at RockWater are some of the most competent people I’ve ever worked with, and can parachute into a new project with lightning speed. They are always the first advisor I call, when I want to do something BIG

Benjamin Vear, President and Member of the Board

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Benjamin Vear

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Super Studios

Super Studios is an innovative web3 creative lab founded by acclaimed crypto thought leader Elliot Wainman (@elliotrades) and his partner Dave Murray. Super Studios is building its corner of the Metaverse called The SuperVerse where its protocol ($SUPER) will be the foundation of an array of dapps. The first two dapps include the sophisticated NFT marketplace Gigamart (shipping Q4 ‘22) and the Play-And-Earn game Impostors (www.impostors.gg). Impostors recently saw its genesis drop sell out in 10 seconds generating over $100M in primary and secondary sales.

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Jason Ziemianski

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At Will Media

At Will Media is an award-winning, full service podcast company. They are the go-to producer for innovative new audio formats, like the first singing competition podcast series for Audible, and the original Siegfried & Roy series for Apple TV+. At Will also makes premium content for brand partners like the New York Times, Netflix, and Marriott Bonvoy. At Will is quickly growing their portfolio of premium scripted and non-fiction originals, and is included in the first audio slate ever featured at the TriBeCa Festival.

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Will Malnati

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Revry

Revry is a uniquely positioned streaming media company representing the newest voices within the LGBTQ+ community, and we’ve had a wonderfully positive experience with RockWater’s support in scaling our opportunities with revenue and partnerships.

Damian Pelliccione, CEO/Co-Founder

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Damian Pelliccione

Chris Rodriguez

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Collabspace

Collabspace is a mobile-first platform for Creators and Creative Freelancers to connect and transact for paid creative gigs and collab opportunities. Their unique platform solution makes these creator economy collabs as seamless as possible — facilitating quick discovery, assessment, communication, management, and payment for creator partners.

Collabspace was built by a team of founders and engineers with extensive creator economy, product, and engineering experience, and is the result of over 25,000 engineering hours. The company’s leadership engaged RockWater to help them develop fundraising strategies and M&A opportunities.

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Dan McKenzie

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Cosmily

Cosmily is a single platform that combines education, discovery, purchase, and community for skincare enthusiasts – generating custom skincare routines from experts and peers powered by data-driven personalization. It is a trusted platform that filters out the noise from branded, augmented, and negative content.

Cosmily has repeatedly engaged RockWater to prepare for its fundraises – creating its pitch, financial model, and sourcing investors.

RockWater has been an invaluable resource, and is the first on my list to call when I need to kick off a fundraise.

Jeff Turnbull, Chief Executive Officer

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Jeff Turnbull

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charactr

charactr is pioneering a wave of next-gen AI clones. having developed proprietary machine learning models and visual technology for Text-to-Speech, Speech-to-Speech, and Image Animation. This allows them to develop custom AI characters for SMBs and enterprises. The characters can be plugged directly into chatGPT’s API or into a company’s specific data set. Use cases include outbound biz dev, marketing content creation, customer information intake, customer retention, more.

RockWater leadership joined as pivotal members of charactr’s executive team to rapidly plan the company’s go-to-market launch and subsequent fundraise.

Mike and the RockWater team have been invaluable partners in transforming charactr’s product into an actionable business plan. I’d recommend them to any early stage tech founder in need of a high caliber swiss army knife

Paul Jaski, Founder and CEO

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Paul Jaski

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