Digital distributor Merzigo is planning a $200 million content investment in 2027, with the United States as the priority market. Wendy McMahon, the former president and CEO of CBS News and Stations and CBS Media Ventures, is leading the stateside push as Merzigo’s senior advisor on U.S. media strategy and growth.
The $200 million plan
The money will go toward rights licensing, U.S.-based production and new YouTube-first projects. McMahon is also working to deepen relationships with U.S. studios, broadcasters and IP owners, arguing that platforms like YouTube have moved well beyond marketing.
“At one point, YouTube and social platforms were largely seen as marketing platforms,” McMahon said. “But they are very much distribution and monetization engines.”
The scorecard so far
Merzigo already counts NBCUniversal, Banijay, Steve Harvey and David Letterman’s Worldwide Pants among its partners. The Letterman deal covers more than 6,000 episodes of “Late Night” and “The Late Show” from 1982 through 2015.
- Steve Harvey: YouTube watch time has risen 407% since April 2025; Facebook views total 2.62 billion; YouTube subscribers now exceed 2.9 million.
- Banijay: Views across the operated portfolio grew from 185.7 million in September 2025 to more than 1.18 billion a year later; revenue doubled across nearly all channels it took over.
- Scale: Merzigo manages more than 6,000 digital channels and 600,000 hours of content, with localization in more than 30 languages.
Why it matters for the screen business
The numbers make a specific argument to media companies sitting on large catalogs: archived programming can become active inventory if it is optimized and localized, not simply uploaded. McMahon’s line is that great IP is not platform dependent and should be rediscovered for new audiences.
Still, the expansion comes with a caveat. Audience scale is only one side of the equation; the real test is whether watch time and view counts convert into durable revenue and stronger licensing deals. Merzigo says human oversight remains part of its model, so brands and franchises are not treated as pure data experiments.
“You want partners who will grow your business and take care of your brands,” McMahon said.
For entertainment marketers, this reframes YouTube from a promo channel to a revenue channel with its own inventory decisions: what to license, how to localize, and when to keep advertising support behind a title. The risk is brand erosion if optimization is applied too aggressively, which is why Merzigo’s human oversight point matters to IP owners who have spent decades building franchises.
The MIPCOM moment
Merzigo will take its U.S. pitch to MIPCOM Cannes, where it will co-host the Oct. 12 opening night party with YouTube. For media planners and rights holders, that appearance is a signal that library monetization is moving from a side channel to a strategic conversation.
The practical takeaway is to measure YouTube-first distribution on revenue, not just reach. A $200 million commitment is a clear test of how much of that opportunity can be captured in the U.S.
Source: TheWrap
