Crackle Plus, LLC

Crackle Plus, LLC ("Crackle Plus") was the operating subsidiary that housed the ad-supported streaming businesses of Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment, Inc. (Nasdaq: CSSE). It was formed in May 2019 as a joint venture in which CSSE held the majority stake and Sony Pictures Television contributed Crackle's U.S. brand, user base and ad sales business; Sony received warrants and later a $40 million preferred stock position when CSSE took 100% ownership in December 2020. Court filings list Crackle Plus at 132 East Putnam Avenue, Cos Cob, Connecticut — CSSE's headquarters. Third-party data aggregators (Datanyze) estimate roughly 107 employees and about $21 million in revenue, but this is not from a primary filing and should be treated as unverified. CSSE's SEC filings reported consolidated figures, not standalone Crackle Plus figures.

Operations. Crackle Plus owned and operated free, ad-supported video-on-demand (AVOD) networks and a subscription platform: Crackle (U.S./Canada), Popcornflix, Popcornflix Kids, Popcornflix Comedy, Truli (faith/family), FrightPix (horror), Españolflix, and the SVOD service Pivotshare. CSSE described it as one of the largest U.S. AVOD operators, distributed across TVs, mobile, consoles and FAST platforms, monetized primarily through advertising.

Litigation posture. Crackle Plus is an operating company and a pure defendant in the tracked data — 0 cases as plaintiff, 1 as defendant. Its sole tracked suit is Helios Streaming, LLC et al. v. Crackle, Inc. et al., No. 1:19-cv-01818, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware. Plaintiffs Helios Streaming (exclusive licensee) and Ideahub, Inc. (owner) asserted ten MPEG-DASH adaptive-bitrate streaming patents, with original development work by Korea's ETRI and licensing funded partly by the Korea Patent Investment Corporation — a non-practicing assertion campaign. Co-defendants included Crackle, Inc., CSSE and Sony entities. The case was coordinated with a parallel Helios suit against Vudu/Walmart, also in Delaware rather than a plaintiff-friendly Texas venue.

Context. CSSE filed Chapter 11 in June 2024, converted to Chapter 7 liquidation in July 2024; Crackle Plus, LLC was a named co-debtor, and Crackle's brand and assets were included in an April 2025 post-bankruptcy auction.