1
View
comments
Ozy Media, the embattled digital news site, has announced it is shutting down following a series of damaging allegations of using smoke-and-mirrors tactics to deceive investors and partners.
'At Ozy, we have been blessed with a remarkable team of dedicated staff,' the company's board of directors said in a statement to the New York Times late on on Friday afternoon.
'Many of them are world-class journalists and experienced professionals to whom we owe tremendous gratitude and who are wonderful colleagues. It is therefore with the heaviest of hearts that we must announce today that we are closing Ozy's doors,' the company added.
Founded by former MSNBC host Carlos Watson in 2013, Ozy had raised a total of $70.3 million in venture capital funding since its inception, and the shutdown means that those investors will likely see their hopes of a return evaporate.
The company's well-heeled investors include the Berlin-based media powerhouse Axel Springer and Laurene Powell Jobs' Emerson Collective.
Ozy has faced a snowballing crisis after a Times story earlier this week said the company's COO, Samir Rao, impersonated a YouTube executive on a call with Goldman Sachs while attempting to raise $40 million from the investment bank, a potential case of securities fraud.
