Steven Bartlett's $425M Creator Empire: The Next Disney or Risky Bet?
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Steven Bartlett's $425M Creator Empire: The Next Disney or Risky Bet?
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About this listen
This past week, the big headline in the business world was Steven Bartlett’s audacious push to become the next Disney—well, in his own words at least. According to The Observer, Bartlett, best known as a Dragons’ Den investor and the voice behind The Diary of a CEO, stunned UK media and excited analysts by raising a secretive, massive eight-figure sum from a dream team of venture capitalists and angel investors for his media and technology holding company, steven.com. He’s framing it as the largest-ever single investment in a European creator holding company, with his enterprise now reportedly valued at $425 million. Named investors include Slow Ventures and Christian Angermayer, with Bartlett himself retaining over 90 percent ownership. The real strategic play is to merge all his creator-facing brands—FlightStory, his podcasting empire, his VC fund FlightFund—under one umbrella and turn creator IP into globally resonant franchises, claiming the creator is now the new Disney character. Forbes has recently listed Bartlett among the world’s top 50 digital creators for 2025, and Time magazine placed him in the “Leaders” category of its inaugural TIME100 Creators list.
Amid the hype, industry voices in The Observer caution that betting so much on a single person’s brand is risky, citing examples like Yung Filly’s dropped deals and legacy brands burned by creator controversies, but Bartlett’s circle seems unfazed by old reputational hiccups—including claims by the BBC last year that he platformed health misinformation on his podcast. Core growth, according to MIDiA analyst Ben Woods, lies in FlightCast, Bartlett’s just-launched platform aimed at helping video podcasters explode their reach—a product co-developed with a former MrBeast engineer. The hope from investors is less about Bartlett’s personal charisma and more about spinning off franchises, merchandise, and formats, with creators driving more authentic audience engagement than legacy media.
From a headlines perspective, his Diary of a CEO podcast continued to make news, notably landing major guests, with AOL reporting on an October 30th episode featuring former US Vice President Kamala Harris. Social media buzz, especially on X and LinkedIn, is rife with speculation around his purported Disney ambitions and celebrations of his fundraising. There’s a mix of admiration for his hustle and ongoing debate around the risks of the “one-man brand” model, especially as Bartlett negotiates controversies—such as being critiqued by the BBC and UK advertising standards authorities over lack of disclosures and health misinformation episodes.
In business, Bartlett’s influence continues to ripple across tech and creator sectors, with his recent co-ownerships of US tech platform Stan Store and health drink brand Ketone-IQ, as well as the PerfectTed energy drink, which is now valued at over £140 million since his 2023 Dragons’ Den investment. Recent media coverage—by outlets like Startup Rise EU and EU Startups—frames him as setting the benchmark for the European creator economy, both embracing and re-shaping the creator-to-empire model that US influencers have trailblazed. Whether or not he ever lands a show on Disney Plus as predicted in some media, there’s no denying Steven Bartlett now occupies rarefied air among Europe’s business and digital elite.
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