Super Cooper: Unwell’s podcast empire soars to $500 million valuation after strategic investment

Alex Cooper‘s business is halfway to unicorn status. Unwell, the media company founded by the Call Her Daddy host and her husband Matt Kaplan, has achieved a valuation of $500 million after receiving a strategic investment from WTSL.

WTSL, the firm led by Patrick Whitesell, did not disclose the exact size of its investment. The half-billion-dollar valuation, however, represents a significant uptick for Cooper’s net worth. Back in 2024, SiriusXM paid $125 million to forge a pact with Cooper that included exclusive content.

After climbing the podcast charts, Cooper made a splash in 2023 when she announced the launch of a company that would build multimedia franchises around big-name creators. Not all of the Unwell launch partners have stuck around, but the network continues to thrive while expanding its scope. The launch of the Unwell Creative Agency leveraged Cooper’s deep understanding of the podcast industry, while shows like the Unwell Winter Games demonstrated her affinity for Gen Z culture.

“Trust has become the ultimate distribution channel and seventy million women a month tune into Unwell,” Cooper said in a statement

. “We’re scaling on all fronts, combining nimbleness, social-first premium content, and our understanding of culture to serve this highly influential audience. With WTSL’s backing, the company is now also poised to accelerate our media platform’s growth through acquisitions and investments.”

Unwell’s growth can’t be denied, but its operations have left some observers feeling (pardon the pun) unwell. Earlier this year, Bloomberg reported on the high amount of turnover at the company and described its offerings as a “sputtering slate of shows.” Cooper herself is a big draw with a strong built-in audience (just ask NBC), but she still has a ways to go to prove that her acumen can be applied to other people’s programs.

The investment from WTSL will help Cooper accomplish that goal. She now has a sizable war chest she can deploy to acquire the assets that will further Unwell’s rapid growth. There are some important choices to make, and Cooper and Kaplan will be the ones making the calls.