RedBird Capital and Investment Group StepStone Group Acquires Casting Company Talent Systems – Deadline

Private equity firm RedBird Capital Partners and private markets investment firm StepStone Group have acquired a majority stake in Talent Systems, a key player in the casting industry.

Based in Los Angeles, Talent Systems has casting software and operates a talent marketplace for the entertainment industry. He was trained by co-CEOs Rafi Gordon and Alex Amin. As of 2021, he had over 50,000 projects under management and facilitated over 2 million auditions in film, television, advertising, theater and digital productions.

Financial terms were not disclosed. Last year, Talent Systems itself struck a pair of big deals, acquiring reality casting platform ETribez and production team network Staff Me Up. Also part of the Talent Systems Casting Networks portfolio are Spotlight, Cast It Systems and Casting Frontier.

RedBird Partner Andy Gordon described Talent Systems as “a platform that delivers efficiencies to a media and entertainment ecosystem managing a massive increase in supply and demand for content creation.”

Given RedBird’s investment experience and connections in the entertainment industry, he added, “together we have the opportunity to continue to scale their business when it is needed.” Not needed anymore. We are also delighted that Rafi and Alex, together with their management team and their existing financial partner, Caltius, will continue to hold a significant stake in the future. »

In a joint statement, Gordon and Amin praised “RedBird’s long track record of building successful long-term businesses, coupled with its deep expertise in the entertainment industry.” They added, “We are confident that the partnership and resources that RedBird brings will add to the company’s trajectory and our primary goal of delivering best-in-class technology capabilities to our customers in the talent segments, casting directors, studios and agencies. .”

Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson served as legal advisors to RedBird. William Blair served as financial advisor to Talent Systems and Morgan Lewis & Bockius served as legal advisor to the company.