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The Warner Bros Accelerator was a rare mix of world-class resources and truly kind people. It's not every day you get to work with the creators and brands that shaped your imagination. The Warner Bros team made us feel seen, supported, and inspired to do our best work. I’d apply again if they’d let me!”
June 9–12
IN PERSON PROGRAM
Burbank, CA
LOCATION
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A program that accelerates opportunities for emerging tech companies to build towards strategic partnerships with Warner Bros Discovery
Our Innovate On The Lot program is geared towards connecting start-ups and founders with WBD leaders to find new ways to connect with our fans, reach a new generation of fans, and build new products around our iconic brands.
POWERED BY
While we are open to any start-ups innovating in the media and entertainment space, this year’s cohort search is focused on three key themes:
Start-ups accepted into the program get access to business leaders from across the company, insights from our teams on what solutions lead to long-term commercial partnerships, and a chance to work with our iconic brands in creative new ways.
1
IP monitoring and tracking across different platforms, deepfake detection and analysis
IP Protection & Content Moderation
2
Personalization, asset adaptation & clipping, performance optimization and social intelligence
Marketing Creation & Distribution
3
Automated brand guideline review, music clearance process optimization, market compliance and localization
Approvals & Rights Management
Warner Bros. Discovery copyrights and trademarks are the property of Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. or its subsidiaries and affiliates. All rights reserved.
VISITOR AGREEMENT |
PRIVACY POLICY
Our Innovate on the Lot program is geared towards connecting start-ups and founders with WBD leaders to find new ways to connect with our fans, reach a new generation of fans, and build new products around our iconic brands.
Start-ups accepted into the program get access to business leaders from across the company, insights from our tech and legal teams on what solutions lead to long-term commercial partnerships, and a chance to work with our iconic brands in creative new ways.
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2025 cohort
2025 COHORT
Frequently Asked Questions
Is my company eligible to apply?
How can I apply?
When is Innovate On The Lot?
If accepted, what kind of time commitment is expected of me?
If accepted, will my expenses be covered?
Does participation in the program require giving up equity?
I still have questions, what should I do?
Your company should apply if you are: Already generating revenue; Operating in, or developing relevant services for, the media and entertainment industry; Two founder or executive-level team members are available from June 9th-June 12th in-person event in Burbank, California. Companies located in the following countries/territories are restricted from participating: Cuba, Iran, Syria, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela. All companies accepted to participate in the Innovate on the Lot event will be required to sign a program agreement.
Two founder or executive-level team members will be required to attend Innovate On The Lot’s in-person program June 9-12 in Burbank, California. During this program, we expect cohort companies’ full participation at the following events: Welcome Event from 3pm-7pm PT on Monday, June 9th Innovate on the Lot Program from 9am-5pm PT on Tuesday-Thursday June 10th-12th An additional Networking event from 5:30pm-7pm PT on Wednesday June 11th.
You can find the application HERE. Once you submit, our team will be in touch to discuss next steps.
Innovate On The Lot will take place at Warner Bros. Discovery in Burbank, CA from June 9-12, 2025.
WBD will not take any equity in the company as a condition to participate in Innovate On The Lot.
If accepted lunch most days will be provided for two founder or executive-level team members. Hotel accommodations and travel to and from California for Innovate On The Lot will not be covered.
If your question was not answered above, please reach out to us at questions@innovateonthelot.com
If your question was not answered above and it prohibits you from completing the application, please reach out to us at [emailaddress.tocome.com]
WBD will not take any equity in the company as a condition to participate in Innovate On The Lot. [Rather, we would request an option that if certain milestones are met (e.g. a commercial deal is reached), we would have an option to invest in the company’s next financing round.]
Two founder or executive-level team members will be required to attend Innovate On The Lot’s in-person program June 9-12 in Burbank, California. During this program, we expect cohort companies’ full participation from 9am-5pm, with an additional Networking event on Wednesday June 11th from 5:30pm-7pm
Your company should apply if you are: Already generating revenue; Operating in, or developing relevant services for, the media and entertainment industry; Have an innovator’s mindset.
Your company should apply if you are: Already generating revenue; Operating in, or developing relevant services for, the media and entertainment industry; Two founder or executive-level team members are available from June 9th-June 12th in-person event in Burbank, California. Please note that companies located in the following countries / territories are restricted from participating: Cuba, Iran, Syria, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela. All companies accepted to participate in the Innovate on the Lot event will be required to sign a program agreement.
Apply Now
This year’s Innovate On The Lot Accelerator cohort includes:
Warner Bros. Discovery (Nasdaq: WBD) today announces their 2025 cohort for their Innovate On The Lot Accelerator Program (powered by Amazon Web Services and ArentFox Schiff). The selected companies will have an opportunity to work with our business leaders with the goal of building strategic partnerships with WBD.
ABLO AI is a creator-led commerce platform that enables the next 200M+ creators to design and monetize their creativity and sell worldwide in minutes, while collaborating with the most iconic brands and IPs.
Bria is an enterprise-grade Visual Generative AI Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) that empowers businesses to build, customize, and deploy visual AI solutions, unlocking new revenue streams from their IP. Bria believes in a world where AI innovation is balanced with responsibility, and the technology that enhances human creativity respects data ownership. Their platform is built entirely on 100% legally licensed data with a patented attribution layer and built-in moderation guardrails that ensure copyright compliance, ethical sourcing, and commercial safety without compromising quality. It delivers high-performing, brand-consistent outputs with full creative control. Bria's platform is designed for speed and flexibility, supporting a wide range of development needs through open-source tools, robust APIs, low-code/no-code interfaces, and multiple deployment options
Coactive AI is a Multimodal Application Platform that maximizes the value of content by making it easy to search, tag, and analyze images and videos, especially in media and entertainment and other online industries. These companies often manage massive image and video libraries but have limited tools to find and organize what they need. Coactive helps search, organize, and analyze content at scale, without relying on manual tagging efforts.
CopySight is a first-to-market copyrighting tool for AI-generated content. It enables enterprise and entertainment studios to use AI-generated content confidently by ensuring copyrightability, identifying IP infringement risks, and safeguarding the creation process. CopySight’s core mission is to protect creators' intellectual property.
Moments Lab builds AI-native tools that let teams go from prompt to content with agentic workflows. MXT-2 analyzes live and archived video, generating human-like descriptions that unlock new creative possibilities. Mediahub centralizes your video library, auto-indexes content, and surfaces key moments instantly. Together, they empower content teams to produce faster, collaborate better, and turn massive archives into revenue.
PeakMetrics is an AI-driven narrative intelligence company that helps media and entertainment companies monitor and understand the evolving narratives around their releases, intellectual property (IP), and brand reputation across the digital landscape. They use first-party datasets from social media, news, blogs, and podcasts to provide critical insights into how narratives are spreading, who is amplifying them, and where they originated. In an era shaped by AI, geopolitical tension, and fast-moving online platforms, narratives can gain traction quickly, impacting your brand, industry, or executives. Their platform can identify potential risks like leaked content, negative sentiment impacting box office performance, and the misuse of IP, especially concerning generative AI.
Podqi is an AI-powered IP protection platform designed for entertainment companies and rights holders to monitor, surface, and act on infringements across the digital landscape. Backed by General Catalyst, Podqi enables legal and brand teams to automate detection, evidence gathering, and enforcement at scale - including unauthorized e-commerce listings, impersonating domains, and more. Built for enterprise workflows, Podqi combines proprietary image recognition, platform integrations, and risk-based prioritization to reduce manual workload and maximize impact. The platform also supports deep evidence logging, customizable outreach, and takedown automation, empowering customers to not only eliminate infringing use but also identify high-value offenders for licensing or legal action. Podqi is purpose-built to address today’s IP enforcement challenges - especially in fast-moving online environments where reactive approaches fall short.
SourceAudio is the music industry's premier licensing marketplace, connecting licensors and licensees at unprecedented scale as the industry's most widely adopted sync platform. Serving over 600,000 users and aggregating over 33 million songs, the platform processes 500,000 weekly searches to create unparalleled connectivity between rightsholders and content creators across global media networks, agencies, and platforms. With expertise in music discovery, delivery, tracking, and payments, SourceAudio leverages its vast collective of aggregated rights and rightsholder partnerships to streamline licensing for a variety of commercial uses, maximizing revenue opportunities through fully cleared solutions in TV, film, radio, podcasts, advertising, digital media, and AI applications.
SponsorIQ is an advanced computer vision technology company - developed from years of elite-level sports analytics - to precisely measure and value sponsorship exposure. Their AI engine evaluates every frame of live and on-demand video, quantifying on-screen brand presence, contextual relevance, and overall sponsorship performance, giving brands and rights-holders clear, actionable metrics to optimize their spend.
TV Labs transforms connected TV testing by providing instant, remote access to real consumer devices across all major TV brands, eliminating costly physical labs. Their AI-powered, vision-based automation catches UI bugs early while high-fidelity streaming ensures pixel-perfect content verification and color accuracy across diverse hardware. Integrated QoS monitoring delivers insights into app performance, load times, and ad delivery optimization, enabling teams to maximize user engagement and revenue. As the connected TV ecosystem explodes and streaming quality becomes directly tied to subscriber retention, TV Labs has become essential infrastructure for media companies and app developers, dramatically reducing testing overhead while accelerating time-to-market for global teams.
ViralMoment is a video intelligence platform built for the era of social video. Powered by proprietary AI, ViralMoment decodes millions of social videos to deliver clear, actionable insights, fast. Brands rely on ViralMoment to see how they show up in social conversations, track competitors, spot cultural shifts, and uncover what truly resonates with audiences. Their platform combines intuitive dashboards with AI Agents trained to answer today’s toughest social questions in seconds, turning the chaos of social video into strategy. ViralMoment helps brands stop guessing and start seeing what really drives conversation and impact across consumers, brands, and competitors.
Wantent is an AI-powered SaaS platform that analyzes viewers' emotions to help marketers create more engaging video content and gain deeper audience insights. Going far beyond focus groups and surveys, Wantent AI tracks facial movements and microexpressions, which are then analyzed for emotional engagement across a range of 20 different emotions. Their system currently employs a robust framework of 150+ attributes for emotional analysis and content attribution. Media companies, brands, and advertising agencies are utilizing Wantent to gain valuable information and authentic insights into consumers' true feelings towards their advertising and content. To enable real-time, scalable content testing, Wantent is developing the Emotional Intelligence Engine, an advanced system that combines AI agents, audience-specific emotional profiles, performance data, and content attributes. It delivers real-time insights for UGC, performance marketing, and influencer campaigns.
Meet the 2025 Cohort
Warner Bros. Discovery (Nasdaq: WBD) today announces their 2025 cohort for their Innovate On The Lot Accelerator Program (powered by Amazon Web Services and ArentFox Schiff). The selected companies will have an opportunity to work with our business leaders with the goal of building strategic partnerships with WBD. This year’s Innovate On The Lot Accelerator cohort includes:
