American Fox Entertainment announced an equity stake in Holywater, a Ukraine-born creator of vertical video series, to produce new AI-powered shows and explore advertising and brand deals, Fox and Holywater reported in a press release.
Fox Entertainment Studios will produce over 200 vertical video titles for Holywater’s My Drama platform over the next two years. The first series, Billionaire Blackmail and Bound by Obsession, are currently in production in Atlanta, Georgia.
Holywater, a leader in the exploding $8 billion global vertical video market, was founded in Ukraine in 2020 by Bogdan Nesvit and Anatolii Kasianov.
The company combines AI and digital-first production to create vertical series, e-books, and serialized content, including micro-dramas, the inaugural vertical video series.
Its platforms – My Drama, FreeBits, My Passion, and My Muse – reach over 55 million users worldwide and rank among the top vertical video and digital content platforms in Europe and the US.
Holywater became a major competitor to Chinese “vertical dramas,” learning to earn tens of millions of dollars from ultra-short smartphone series. In August, My Drama took sixth place in the ranking of vertical drama services that are growing the fastest, according to the American analytical platform Insightrackr, Forbes Ukraine reported.
Producing one season, typically consisting of up to a hundred short episodes, costs Holywater about $100,000. The company has been growing four to five times annually, and its founders expect total revenue to exceed $90 million in 2024, with roughly a quarter generated by the My Drama platform.
The average budget of a Holywater’s original series – up to $100,000 per season. Generative AI and in-house post-production optimize costs by another 40%, the founders told Forbes Ukraine.
The partnership between Holywater and Fox will focus on producing original vertical video series, exploring advertising and brand deals, supporting creator-driven content, and adapting existing Fox shows for vertical formats. The companies plan to announce development deals with Hollywood talent in the near future, the press release says.
Fox Entertainment has operated for nearly 40 years, running scripted and unscripted studios, the animation unit Bento Box Entertainment, and maintaining a content library of over 350 films. The company distributes content on platforms including Netflix, Disney, and Apple+.
Ukraine’s Holywater joins forces with Fox Entertainment to revolutionize digital storytelling
The collaboration combines Fox’s production capabilities and global distribution reach with Holywater’s AI-driven content creation and expertise in vertical streaming. Fox Entertainment Studios will oversee the production of the 200+ series for My Drama, covering multiple genres including drama, thriller, and romance.
“Innovation in digital storytelling is shaping the future of entertainment and investing in vertical video positions Fox Entertainment to achieve sustained, long-term growth as we build a modern studio for the future,” Rob Wade, CEO of Fox Entertainment, said. “Hollywater is at the forefront of this evolution, skillfully using technology to fuel creativity.”
Holywater works with global creators and studios and uses partnerships with Meta, Google, and TikTok to extend its audience. This year, it was one of the fastest-growing companies in Europe, the press release says.
Through its partnership with Fox Entertainment, Holywater aims to bring vertical series into the mainstream, expand genres, and build a large library of content.
“Vertical streaming is one of the fastest-growing areas in entertainment, and our goal at Holywater is to make vertical series mainstream by raising the bar on quality and widening the genre slate,” Holywater co-founders and co-CEOs Bogdan Nesvit and Anatolii Kasianov said. “We’ve been focusing on storytelling depth to prove that verticals can carry premium drama, thriller, romance, and more – not just a narrow set of tropes.”
Holywater started by launching multiple mobile apps focused on rapid user growth, reaching $1 million in monthly revenue within eight months, Forbes Ukraine reported. By 2021, most apps were paused or sold, while the founders kept two content products: the story game My Fantasy and the romance e-book platform My Passion.
My Drama joined the portfolio in spring 2024, inspired by China’s ReelShort, and quickly became Holywater’s flagship. By August, it ranked sixth among the fastest-growing vertical drama platforms, adding 20,000 users per day, Forbes wrote.
Previously, Nesvit promised their company will create a revolution in Holywood.
“The Chinese rely on scale – their teams count thousands of people,” Laptenok told Forbes Ukraine. Holywater, which develops several projects, employs 130 people. The company’s focus on AI allows the Ukrainians to produce content faster and with fewer expenses.
Holywater’s long-term goal, Nesvit told Forbes Ukraine, is not merely to disrupt the vertical series market but to disrupt Hollywood and traditional streaming itself.
It seems they are succeeding.