Montgomery’s Wheelhouse partners with digital content studio Portal A

Wheelhouse Entertainment, founded and led by former ITV America CEO Brent Montgomery, has struck an investment and partnership deal with content studio Portal A.

Founded by Nate Houghteling, Kai Hasson and Zach Blume, the studio works with emerging talent to develop, produce and distribute branded and original content.

The company claims to have achieved 500% revenue growth since 2013 and amassed a client roster that includes HBO, Warner Bros., Amazon, Universal Pictures, YouTube, Google and more.

It has produced original series with streaming platforms such as YouTube Originals, Crunchyroll and Disney Digital.

Through this collaboration, Wheelhouse and Portal A will offer their combined resources – including Wheelhouse’s creative and large-scale production capabilities, industry relationships and access to talent, and Portal A’s expertise in youth-driven and Millennial-focused content – to traditional and new media platforms as well as  brands and ad agencies.

The deal also represents the first time Portal A has taken on an outside investor since its founding in 2008.

Montgomery said: “Having looked seriously at a lot of digital companies, Portal A is a unicorn; their success is driven by the trifecta of client service, exquisite creative and unique culture – and they run a profitable business, which is rare in the wild west of digital.

“Together, we will develop an aggressive plan for growth for these incredible content creators who can work at a high level with brands, as well as with talent that can evolve into brands. It’s exactly the kind of investment and partnership that drove me to create Wheelhouse. And while those of us who hail from the TV world are psyched to get millions of impressions, the work these guys make reaches billions. Portal A is the first significant piece of a much larger marketing play for Wheelhouse.”

In November 2018, Wheelhouse and Jimmy Kimmel joined forces to launch Kimmelot, a new media company operating in partnership with Wheelhouse Entertainment, with Kimmel also becoming a partner in Wheelhouse.

Also under the Wheelhouse banner is Spoke Studios, the company’s first production label, which maintains a production partnership with ITV America, where Montgomery previously served as CEO.