Substack, the five-year-old newsletter platform that has aggressively positioned itself as a disruptive force in media, has abandoned efforts to raise a Series C round, The New York Times is reporting today. According to its sources, Substack held discussions with potential investors in recent months about raising $75 million to $100 million at a valuation of between $750 million and $1 billion.
Substack, based in San Francisco, was most recently valued at $650 million after closing a $65 million Series B round in March of last year led by earlier investor Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). It had earlier raised a $15.3 million Series A round led by a16z in 2019.
Substack originally launched as a way to turn newsletters into a paid subscription business, inviting anyone with an interest to hop on the platform and start writing for however much they want to charge their readers. Writers were — and still are —