New Zealand’s tech success stories tend to be the quiet kind: accounting software, logistics platforms, back-office tools that businesses love and consumers never see. Letterboxd breaks that mould. The Auckland-founded film diary and review app is in exclusive, advanced talks with the New York Times Company at a valuation of roughly US$330m, about NZ$585m. That is a US buyer paying a US multiple for a Kiwi-built consumer product, and it is a genuine win.
A newspaper outbid the studios
The price has climbed all year, from US$250m earlier in 2026 to US$300m in September and now US$330m, as Netflix, A24 and Sony Pictures were squeezed out. The Times won partly because it is not a studio. It is seen as able to preserve the platform’s independence without conflicts over the films users review, and one rival bidder reportedly worried others might paywall parts of the service.
The logic fits the Times’ playbook. It bought Wirecutter in 2016, then The Athletic for US$550m and Wordle in 2022, each a standalone product with a loyal audience. The company added 420,000 digital-only subscribers in the third quarter, taking it to 13.8 million, with a target of 15 million by the end of 2027. Letterboxd brings exactly the young users a legacy masthead struggles to reach.
The multiple is for the audience, not the cashflow
On paper the price looks rich. Letterboxd’s projected 2026 EBITDA is around US$15m, rising to more than US$20m in 2027, putting the deal at roughly 20-22 times current earnings. Current earnings are only about 4.5% of the purchase price.
The growth explains it. The platform went from 3 million users in January 2021 to 28 million by April 2026, with more than half under 35. Membership hit 30.7 million in the second quarter, up 43% year on year, and is now approaching 35 million. LionTree banker Alex Michael called it “a phenomenon” in September, noting it draws 30 million monthly users “with zero paid marketing” and that its biggest cohort is aged 18-24.
That last point is the lesson for Kiwi founders. Letterboxd did not buy its way to scale. Its viral “Four Favorites” videos did the marketing. Capital efficiency is a feature, not a constraint.
Patient capital got paid
In 2023 Canadian holding company Tiny, run by Andrew Wilkinson, bought 60% of the business at a valuation of only US$50-60m. A sale at US$330m would hand Tiny roughly a five- to six-fold return in three years.
Founders Matthew Buchanan and Karl von Randow each took around US$15m in that 2023 deal and kept 20% apiece. That combined 40% stake would be worth about US$132m (NZ$234m) at the reported price. Selling part early, staying in the saddle and riding the upside is about as clean a founder outcome as exists.
The value is real, the question is where it lands
There is a harder point that the celebratory coverage skips. A 2026 Dealroom and NZ Growth Capital Partners report put the combined value of New Zealand’s venture-backed firms at NZ$133 billion, finding the country generates unusually high value relative to the venture capital invested. It also warned of a “double loss” when Kiwi-founded companies grow offshore, missing both the original value and the recycling of talent and capital into the next generation. About 6% of venture-backed start-ups relocated, carrying 17% of the value created.
Letterboxd fits that pattern. Control went to Canada in 2023 and would now pass to New York. Its roughly 40 staff are spread across New Zealand, the US, Canada and the UK. The founders would stay in charge, reporting to a Times executive, with the site run standalone and plugged into the Times’ advertising systems.
None of that is a criticism. Capital should go where returns are, and US buyers paying US multiples is the market working. But the policy lesson is not more grants. It is making New Zealand a place where founders want to reinvest their windfall, through sensible tax treatment of investment, fewer barriers to hiring senior talent, and a deeper local capital market.
What happens next
The deal could still fall over, and nothing is signed. If it closes, the real test comes later: whether two founders sitting on a nine-figure stake back the next Auckland consumer app. That is how one exit becomes an ecosystem.
Sources
- NZ Herald: New York Times close to buying Auckland’s Letterboxd for US$330m deal (2026-11-06)
- RNZ: NZ tech founders’ Letterboxd valued at $330m in New York Times deal (2026-11-06)
- TechCrunch: The New York Times reportedly in talks to buy Letterboxd for $330 million (2026-11-05)
- TheWrap: Letterboxd sale, Gigi Pritzker investor consortium acquisition interest (2026-10-08)
- TheWrap: New York Times enters exclusive talks to buy Letterboxd for $330 million (2026-11-05)
- IndieWire: Letterboxd sale finalization and New York Times acquisition details (2026-11-05)
- GDNonline: New York Times Company in advanced talks to acquire Letterboxd for roughly $330 million (2026-11-06)
- The Conversation: NZ creates remarkably valuable tech firms. How can it keep more of the benefits? (2026-08-16)
- Variety: New York Times in exclusive negotiations to acquire Letterboxd (2026-11-05)
- Deadline: One of Letterboxd’s bankers calls it ‘a phenomenon’ (2026-09-24)
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