Doug Emslie has taken an investment position in Semafor
article excerpt from Isabella Simonetti, Reporter, The Wall Street Journal
The media startup Semafor has raised $30 million in new financing that values the
company at $330 million after its first profitable year.
The roughly three-year-old startup, which counts KKR co-founder Henry Kravis, David
Rubenstein of Carlyle Group and Penny Pritzker’s PSP Partners among its backers,
aims to hire more journalists and expand its live-events business. This is the company’s
first priced round and valuation.
Known for the pale-yellow hue of its website and newsletters, Semafor set out to
connect with readers in part by breaking its articles into sections such as the news, the
reporter’s perspective and alternative points of view. It publishes newsletters, a podcast
and produces live events tailored to what Chief Executive Officer Justin Smith describes
as “the global leadership class”: C-suite executives, government leaders and public
policymakers.
Smith, the former CEO of Bloomberg Media, co-founded the company in 2022 with
former BuzzFeed News editor Ben Smith, who is now Semafor’s editor in chief (and not
related). The pair are trying to build a brand on par with business publications such as
the Economist or the Financial Times.
Semafor’s newsletters are currently ad-supported and free to read, though the
publication plans to explore offering subscriptions longer term.
The news industry is broadly under pressure, but journalism targeted at decision
makers is “relatively healthy,” Justin Smith said.
Large publishers are grappling with declines in traffic from Google as artificial-
intelligence chatbots change how consumers seek information online. And audiences
are increasingly turning to social media and short-form video platforms for news.
Other news startups have struggled. A digital-news company, the Messenger, said it
was shutting down in early 2024 after less than a year of operation. Shares
of BuzzFeed are down more than 90% since it went public in 2021.
Semafor generated $2 million in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and
amortization in 2025, the first year it was profitable. Half of the $40 million in revenue it
generated last year came from advertising, while the rest was from sponsorships for its
live-journalism events, which sit at “the center of our company, the center of our
newsroom,” Justin Smith said.
It employs journalists in areas including the U.S., Africa, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and the
U.K.
The $30 million in new funding will help expand Semafor’s World Economy annual CEO
gathering in Washington, D.C., and explore new markets for events. Semafor plans to
hire more journalists and expand the publication of its D.C., Gulf and business
newsletters. It also aims to launch a CEO-focused China newsletter.
More than 60% of the fresh investment comes from existing backers including Kravis
and Rubenstein, the company said. PSP, the Belgian entrepreneur Thomas Leysen and
the media company Antenna Group are among its new investors.
Semafor launched with $25 million in financing from wealthy investors, including media
industry executives and the now-disgraced cryptocurrency tycoon Sam Bankman-Fried.
It raised $19 million in 2023 partly to repurchase roughly $10 million in financing from
him.
Justin Smith said the company works to deliver journalism that is “completely global in
outlook, really focused on high-quality independent, I would say even, cerebral
journalism” that tries to explain the world to the “leadership class.”