A new $50 million fund is targeting media, entertainment, and creator economy startups, tapping into Hollywood networks and the UAE’s growing appetite for cultural investment.
US investment firm Guggenheim Brothers Media is launching the fund with backing from Abu Dhabi-based Ethmar International Holding.
The firm is led by Dillon Lawson-Johnston and Criswell Fiordalis, who are looking to write checks of $2 million to $5 million, targeting 10 to 15 companies. They hope to grow the fund to as much as $75 million.
The pair brings extensive entertainment and cultural ties. Lawson-Johnston is the great-great-grandson of Solomon R. Guggenheim, founder of New York City’s famed Guggenheim Museum, and has experience from UTA, Sugar23, Untitled Entertainment, and Anonymous Content. Fiordalis has had roles at Lionsgate, MRC, Hello Sunshine, and Webtoon. The two had previously invested in Stapleview, a comedy platform, and The Lighthouse, Whalar Group’s campus for creators.
EIH is an investment holding company that’s led by a prominent member of a UAE ruling family. The UAE, like other Gulf nations, has been pouring money into US media and entertainment as it tries to diversify away from oil. One UAE government project, Creators HQ, aims to get 10,000 creators to relocate to the country. Lawson-Johnston’s family is set to open the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi in 2026.
“We’re investing in creativity and culture, and we’re looking to leverage this amazing museum that’s being built,” Lawson-Johnston said.
He and Fiordalis want to deploy the fund mainly in the US, where the creator economy is more mature. The Interactive Advertising Bureau estimated that advertisers would spend $37 billion with creators in 2025, a sum that it says is growing four times faster than overall media spending.
Here are four trends the new fund is betting on:
1. Creators are trying to transcend ‘key man risk’
Investors tend to shy away from backing individual creators because of the risk of overdependence on a single person, also called “key man risk.” That’s why some big names like Steven Bartlett and Alex Cooper are building networks of complementary creators (and attracting millions of dollars in the process).
Fiordalis and Lawson-Johnston are interested in creators who are looking beyond themselves when building talent-related businesses.
They’ll also look at companies that develop creators through talent management or other services. One example is their earlier investment in Stapleview, which manages social media-born comedians and produces with them.
2. Hollywood has franchises ripe for extension
Traditional media companies have a lot of intellectual property that they want to give new life to in digital media. It’s why Disney did a deal that’ll open its vault of famous characters to OpenAI.
Fiordalis and Lawson-Johnston, both of whom have spent time at legacy media companies, envision a mutually beneficial way for creators and Hollywood to collaborate in this area and aim to facilitate this process.
“If you’re SpongeBob SquarePants, what do you do other than taking SpongeBob and slapping it on YouTube and saying, ‘Oh, we now have a digital presence?'” Lawson-Johnston said.
3. Creators are top of mind for advertisers
Brands are clamoring to get their message out using creators, leveraging influencers’ built-in distribution and popularity among younger consumers. The IAB found in November that brands were most eager to work with mid-tier creators — those with between 50,000 and 500,000 followers — because of their ability to drive sales and awareness.
Fiordalis and Lawson-Johnston see an opportunity to back platforms that connect such influencers with brands using a mix of people and technology. They pointed to the platform Kyra, which raised $15 million in 2022, as one they admire.
“There’s a lot of, not top creators, but downstream creators that have way more engagement and can drive a lot more value to said brand,” Fiordalis said.
4. Advertisers want better measurement
As more brands shift their budgets to creators, they face increasing pressure to prove that their spending has paid off. Brands have gone from just caring about a creator’s follower count to looking at other ways to prove efficacy.
Fiordalis and Lawson-Johnston are interested in companies trying to standardize how creators are measured.
“Who’s standardizing the definition of value across these platforms and across pieces of content?” Fiordalis said. “I think the industry is getting to a point where it needs that.”
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