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Valnet, Inc. is a Canadian media company established in August 2012 by Hassan and Sam Youssef in Montreal, Quebec. It operates primarily in the entertainment media industry, where it has sought to acquire producers of content in this space. In this way, it has become the parent company of several internet media publications including TheGamer, Collider, Comic Book Resources, MovieWeb, Screen Rant, Game Rant, XDA Developers, and MakeUseOf. There have been complaints from writers about working conditions and the low pay offered by the company, and employees have said the company prioritises "mass quantity over quality" and "SEO bait" content.
The company started a YouTube channel in January 2016 called "Little Angel", which provides animated content aimed at toddlers. By April 6, 2016, the company acquired Comic Book Resources, with Valnet CEO Hassan Youssef retaining the editorial team and taking over their offices. On November 17, 2020, Valnet announced that it had acquired Collider. Valnet acquired XDA along with four other websites—Pocketnow, AppAdvice, BackyardBoss and Hook&Bullet—from Busy Pixel Media in February 2022. Also that month, the company sold Little Angel to Moonbug, the owner of Cocomelon. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
In May 2023, it was reported that Valnet had laid off several key figures at subsidiary Comic Book Resources ( CBR), including editor-in-chief Adam Swiderski, senior new editor Stephen Gerding, and senior features editor Christopher Baggett. In June, it was reported that CBRs employees had been finding difficulty in keeping up with Valnet's content demand. The company was reportedly "seemingly firing those who try and stand up for writers" in its bid to attempt to improve its work culture and performance. Fired staff vocalized discontent for these firings on Twitter, due to what was allegedly the full shutdown of the website news section, which the company refuted.
Valnet acquired OpenCritic by August 2024 in an attempt to integrate the aggregator into its other businesses in the gaming sector. It announced plans to turn the site into a social media platform. The company signed a lease for the 740 Broadway building in New York City by October 2024, being the company's first offices in the city.
TheWrap spoke to 15 current or former Valnet contractors in 2025 regarding alleged exploitative working conditions at the company; one freelancer had also recently filed a lawsuit against the company for exploitation. TheWrap article led to Valnet and Hassan Youssef filing a lawsuit in April 2025 against the website's company The Wrap News Inc. for defamation.
On May 1, 2025, Valnet acquired Polygon from Vox Media.
Collider was founded in 2005 by editor-in-chief Steven Weintraub as a blog. In 2015, Weintraub sold Collider to Complex Media, who would manage the business and advertisements on the website and offer editing support. On November 17, 2020, Valnet announced that it had acquired Collider.
Comic Book Resources ( CBR) was founded by Jonah Weiland in 1995 as a development of the Kingdom Come Message Board, a message forum that Weiland created to discuss DC Comics' then-new mini-series of the same name.
CBR has featured columns by industry professionals such as Robert Kirkman, Gail Simone, and Mark Millar. Other columns were published by comic book historians and critics such as George Khoury and Timothy Callahan.
By April 4, 2016, CBR was sold to Valnet, after which the site was relaunched as CBR.com on August 23, 2016, with the blogs integrated into the site. Popverse reported that following the acquisition by Valnet "comics were increasingly sidelined for coverage ..., as were both reviews and columns as focuses for publishing; instead, the site refocused on shorter news pieces and reactions to news stories". Valnet Inc. is a subsidiary of Valsef Group, which is also headquartered in Montreal.
MovieWeb first launched in 1995; by 1997 it was reported to be in operation supported by a 4-person team publishing movie information that, while not 'slick', had a 'certain charm'. In 2012, MovieWeb produced a video which was an '80s-themed parody mashup of The Walking Dead series accompanied by music from Growing Pains that went Viral video.
Previously, MovieWeb was owned by WatchR Media, Inc., a privately held Las Vegas company. In 2021, it was estimated the MovieWeb website had 8 million unique visits for the month of July. MovieWeb has been owned and operated by online publisher Valnet Inc. since September 2021 upon completion of the acquisition from WatchR.
In August 2000, MovieWeb announced a collaboration with video rental chain Video Update and video retail software provider Unique Business Systems Inc.
MovieWeb acts as a distribution partner of Hulu. MovieWeb also produces video content for IMDb.com.
In February 2015, Screen Rant was acquired by Valnet, and was reunited with its sister site, Game Rant, in 2019, when Valnet acquired the other publication. Screen Rant features a video series called Pitch Meetings by YouTube comedian Ryan George. By September 2020, the series included over 200 videos, garnering a combined 250 million views. In the series, George plays both a screenwriter and a film producer in a pitch for a film or television series, describing its plot in a way that highlights various inconsistencies and the way monetary incentives affect the movie industry.
XDA-Developers.com was created by Dutch company NAH6 Crypto Products BV and launched on December 20, 2002. In January 2011, XDA Developers was bought by the US based company JB Online Media, LLC. and subsequently by Canada-based Valnet Inc. in February 2022. The name XDA Developers is originally derived from the O2 XDA, which was marketed as a personal digital assistant (PDA) with extra features."XDA-Developers: The History" ( part one by XDA Administrator "MikeChannon" in October 2010
In 2013, XDA partnered with Swappa to become its official marketplace where users can buy or sell devices.
Valnet acquired XDA along with four other websites—Pocketnow, AppAdvice, BackyardBoss and Hook&Bullet—from Busy Pixel Media in February 2022. In 2023, FeedSpot listed XDA (with 11 million members) as the largest mobile software development forum and among the top 70 technology forums to follow.
Their forum site underwent major redesigns in 2010, 2013, late 2014 (named XDA 2015) and late 2020 (named XDA 2021). The 2013 layout distinctively indicated the number of active and total registered users at the top right, and the 2015 layout supported responsive web design and was available with a dark-on-light color scheme option.
As of 2020, the website features 3 themes, namely XDA, XDA Dark and XDA Classic. The older layout options for XDA 2013 and XDA 2015 were removed in XDA 2021. The website transitioned from vBulletin to XenForo on December 1, 2020, along with a major layout redesign, named XDA 2021.
In 2008, CNET Asia suggested that XDA Developers offers potential solutions to problems with many Android-based mobile devices. In other mobile phone reviews, testers at CNET preferred using XDA Developers' ROMs when carrying out detailed reviews.
The site was built over the course of ten months by eight co-founding editors which included the editors-in-chief of the gaming sites Joystiq, Kotaku and The Escapist. Vox Media produced a documentary series on the founding of the site. In May 2025, Polygon was sold to Valnet.
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