← The Digital Executive
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- [00:00]
A
Foreign. Welcome to Coruscant Technologies, home of the Digital Executive Podcast. Do you work in emerging tech? Working on something innovative? Maybe an entrepreneur? Apply to be a guest at www.corazon.com brand welcome to the Digital Executive. Today's guest is Matt Edelman. Matt Edelman serves as Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President with responsibility for the company's strategy, capital allocation, operations and long term growth. Appointed CEO in April 2025 after serving as President and Chief Commercial Officer, Matt architected a comprehensive corporate restructuring, strengthening the company's balance sheet and raising more than 26 million in six months, culminating in a 20 million private placement in October of 2025. Prior to his appointment as CEO, Matt drove more than 20x revenue, led multiple M and A transactions, oversaw hundreds of brand partnerships, supported the company's successful Nasdaq IPO and helped establish Super League as a defining force in the emerging category of playable media. Well, good afternoon Matt. Welcome to the show.
- [01:16]
B
Thank you so much, Brian.
- [01:18]
A
I appreciate it, my friend. I and I know that it's late for you. I appreciate that. I'm in Kansas City here in the evening. Generally I you're out of the LA area, but tonight you're traveling to Miami. So I appreciate you making the time really do so jumping in Matt, to your first question, if I could. You've spent more than two decades across digital and traditional media advising brands like Nike, Marvel, MTV and Sony Pictures. What fundamental shifts have you seen in how audiences discover, engage with and trust content today?
- [01:51]
B
It's a great question. I think the best way to explain the difference in the modern information and content ecosystem is that trust has shifted from institutions to communities. People believe personalities and the peers that are connected to that personality because those people, including the personalities themselves, engage with you as a consumer of content, as opposed to the monologues that come from talking heads that have existed in linear content channels for decades. And so it's really about that shift from institutions to communities that delivers trust. And I would say the social graph, which has been talked about for ages, has an enormous amount to do with that. It is driven, perhaps not always in a healthy way, by algorithms. And it's also connected to the fact that active engagement causes almost an imprint on your brain that passive engagement does not. And so as soon as you are actively involved in something, you pay more attention to it, you remember it, and you can't help as a result, but start to trust what you remember. And essentially that's why interactive media, playable media, is so significant and meaningful in in our business, playable ads Leave a lasting impression because you are engaging with the ad. It is no different from engagement causing today's consumers to trust information compared to content that is just delivered to them passively.
- [03:55]
A
Thank you. Really appreciate that. The insights are great and trust is a big thing. We talk about that a lot here on the podcast. But you talked about trusts have shifted from traditionally institutions to communities or people. Right, because people trust people more than they do an institution. And it's the mainstream, as I call it. A lot of the old static linear, as you mentioned, mainstream is what people are just kind of, they want to go outside the box now and really look at alternatives or options or maybe they're searching for something that seems to be more, that would resonate with them better. And I like how you broke apart that active versus passive engagement. With active engagement, people pay more attention, they remember more, they trust what you remember. And I thought that was very insightful, so thank you. And Matt, you've operated both inside large enterprises and as a founder of early stage digital media companies. How does your approach to growth and risk differ between startups and global organizations?
- [04:52]
B
You know, that's a great question. The idea of an entrepreneurial executive inside of a big company can sometimes put you in a unfamiliar and uncomfortable box. And so you do have to think and act a bit differently depending on the type of organization. I would say at its core, in startups, speed and focus keep you alive and are the keys to progress and success. Whereas in big companies, the risk is moving too slowly. And so you have to find a way inside of a big company to use speed as an advantage. But whereas speed is a survival requirement in a startup, inside a big company you have to find a way to balance that with more calculated risks and be more disciplined around where you take those risks. Each decision inside of a startup can really move the needle and you want that to happen fast. Inside of a big company, you need to help influence how decisions are made and push for change, but recognize when that's going to take extra time and the pace has to be pulled back a bit.
- [06:20]
A
Thank you and I appreciate you teasing that apart. Obviously, if you're in a startup, you're an entrepreneurial executive, as you said, much different than large organization. And it's that risk and versus speed. And you talked about how big orgs, it's hard to kind of move things a little bit faster and in startups you need that, but you gotta weigh that risk and it's benefit versus risk and I really appreciate that. Matt, having led OTT Properties ESPORTS platforms and fashion media. Where do you see the biggest monetization opportunities emerging for digital content businesses today?
- [06:55]
B
The most important asset in terms of monetization today is data. It is data about the consumer or the audience that you are trying to capture, appeal to and create as a loyal participant in your business, whether that's through consuming and shopping and shopping for and buying your products, or remaining loyal to the content that you're producing. The reason data is so critical is the landscape of how a brand can reach people is so fragmented across a dizzying number of channels that can be serviced by an infinite number of creative advertisements or marketing messages that if you don't have the right message for the right audience, you are likely to lose them and as a result not get a particularly strong outcome. If you are spending money to try to grow your business, that's frankly one of the most interesting things that we find in our business, which is four out of five people under the age of 45 play video games, but very few identify as gamers. And as a result, when gaming comes up as a marketing channel, most of the people who control the budgets think of it as a smaller niche experimental space. What we believe is that the psychology of play drives consumer reactions to content and experiences in a profound way that runs across all marketing channels and that marketers who aren't taking into account the power of play in all of their marketing activity are missing the opportunity to use critical data that will improve their monetization opportunities.
- [09:20]
A
Thank you. I really appreciate that. What I took away from that is the most important asset today in monetization. As I asked, and that question is data. And you talked about trying to appeal to your customers to stay relevant and or scale the business. Obviously. But data is so fragmented and across the consumer spectrum, as you mentioned, you need to get that right message for the right audience and sometimes it's very challenging. And you went into gaming, which I can get into. My son was a professional esports player, so I love being myself. Yeah, and we can go offline and talk about that, but I love that stuff. I really do. And so my last question for the evening here, Matt, your company also took an ownership stake in Hide or die, a top 100 Roblox game with massive engagement metrics. How does transitioning towards owning highly engaged gaming assets rather than just providing services fit into your long term strategy for profitability and brand partnerships?
- [10:20]
B
It's a great question and I appreciate you keeping track of some of our more recent activities. Superleague is really a business that has three functional areas. One is our tech and data function which touches on some of the items I just mentioned. Another is our advertising and marketing solutions business. And then the more recent which is represented by the partnership and equity interest in Hide or Die is our strategic assets activity. And really the way it fits into our strategy is to look at creator economy assets in the gaming sector and recognizing not only that they are under leveraged from a brand partnerships standpoint relative to how many consumers they engage and how much time consumers spend there, but that they are otherwise reliable revenue generators. And especially in the creator economy inside gaming, where there are so many imaginative and talented developers, designers and creators building on platforms like Roblox and Fortnite and Minecraft, and even creating independent mobile games and PC games where there is not necessarily any friction around distribution. If you create something promising and you really grind at getting a strong player base, you have a way to be discovered in most of these platforms based on how they surface strong content. And as a result, the revenue that these assets can generate tends to become meaningful in success. And so it makes a lot of sense for Super League as we've developed this data and product strategy to help monetize audiences who play video games. And we're providing solutions to brands and marketers to help them reach these audiences based on the quality of that data and the scale of those products. That we can add a very compelling dimension to the strategy by now beginning to have an ownership interest in the places where these consumers are so active and passionately engaged so that we can help those owners of those assets make more money by bringing more brand partnerships to their community, but also benefit as an owner based on the revenue that they generate.
- [13:16]
A
That's awesome. Appreciate that. Just breaking apart some of the things that you talked about here, your three main business functions, you got your tech and data function, you talked about advertising and marketing, and then you talked about that strategic assets activity which you went into a little bit partnerships and equity. Right? Creator economy. And we've talked about that several times here recently on the podcast about it's really an opportunity for organizations, companies to get involved with these creators and help connect these partnerships with the creators. And it's a win win. And I know a lot of creators obviously want to grow and make some or monetize as you would say, but connecting the right partners with these folks is a win for everybody. And I appreciate you sharing your insights today. Matt, it was certainly a pleasure having you on today and I look forward to speaking with you real soon.
- [14:05]
B
Thank you Brian. I appreciate the questions and look forward to talking again.
- [14:09]
A
Bye for.