Alex Cooper built her career on big numbers. Now she’s added the biggest one yet.
In 2021, Cooper walked away from Barstool Sports and signed a $60 million deal with Spotify to keep making Call Her Daddy. Three years later, she landed an even bigger contract with SiriusXM worth up to $125 million. This week, a new figure entered the picture: $500 million.
That’s the fresh valuation for Unwell, the media company Cooper co-founded with her husband, film producer Matt Kaplan. The number comes from Unwell’s first-ever outside investment deal, led by WTSL, a media and entertainment investment firm run by longtime Hollywood dealmaker Patrick Whitesell and partner Jason Lublin. WTSL is backed by private equity giant Silver Lake.
The exact amount WTSL is investing hasn’t been made public. Neither has the new ownership split between Cooper, Kaplan, and the firm. But one thing is now official: a serious outside investor just put real money into Unwell at a $500 million pre-money valuation. And Cooper and Kaplan are reportedly planning to use that cash to expand the business well beyond podcasting.
What Does A “$500 Million Pre-Money Valuation” Actually Mean?
This doesn’t mean Alex Cooper received a $500 million check. It also doesn’t mean Unwell was sold.
A pre-money valuation is simply what a company is worth right before new investment money is added. Here’s a simple way to picture it: if WTSL invested $50 million, the resulting post-money valuation would be $550 million, and WTSL would end up owning roughly 9% of the company. That’s just a hypothetical example — the real investment figure hasn’t been confirmed.
What matters most is the backstory. Cooper and Kaplan built and self-funded Unwell without any outside investors until now. This deal sets a real, verified benchmark for what the company is worth, while the founders keep a large — but undisclosed — ownership stake in a business now valued in the hundreds of millions.
How Much Of Unwell Does Alex Cooper Actually Own?
Neither Cooper nor Unwell has revealed her exact ownership percentage. Here’s what we do know: Cooper and Kaplan co-founded and self-financed the company before this deal, which has been confirmed as Unwell’s first outside investment.
That makes it reasonable to assume Cooper still holds a large share of the business, even though any specific number is an estimate.
If Cooper and Kaplan started with something close to an even split, Cooper may have owned somewhere near 50% before factoring in employee equity or other shareholders. The new WTSL investment would dilute that stake slightly. For example, if WTSL invested $50 million at the reported $500 million pre-money valuation, the firm would own around 9% of Unwell after the deal closes. A hypothetical 50% stake for Cooper would then shrink to roughly 45%.
So, until more details come out, a fair working range for Cooper’s ownership sits somewhere between 40% and 50%.
Here’s what that would look like in dollar terms at a $500 million valuation:
- 40% stake → worth around $200 million
- 45% stake → worth around $225 million
- 50% stake → worth around $250 million
Who Is Patrick Whitesell, And Why Does His Investment Matter?
The investor behind this deal is almost as notable as the valuation itself.
Patrick Whitesell spent decades near the top of Hollywood representation. He served as co-CEO of WME and later held senior leadership roles at Endeavor alongside Ari Emanuel. He’s also known for another reason: his ex-wife is Lauren Sanchez, now married to Jeff Bezos.
After leaving Endeavor, Whitesell launched WTSL with backing from Silver Lake. The firm focuses on media, sports, and entertainment companies — specifically ones with the potential to grow into full platforms rather than staying a single hit show or product.
One of WTSL’s other deals will sound familiar to entertainment industry watchers. In 2025, a Whitesell-led investment platform backed Peyton Manning’s Omaha Productions at a valuation north of $750 million, taking roughly a 10% stake worth more than $75 million. WTSL’s portfolio also includes Diamond Baseball Holdings, TMWR Sports, and League One Volleyball.
In short, Whitesell isn’t just buying into a hit podcast. He’s betting Cooper can turn Unwell into a full-scale media company.
Unwell Has Grown Far Beyond A Podcast Network
Cooper and Kaplan launched Unwell in 2023 under their holding company, Trending.
At first, the obvious centerpiece was Call Her Daddy, alongside a growing lineup of podcasts built around young creators. But Kaplan brought something crucial to the table: real Hollywood production experience. His company, ACE Entertainment, produced Netflix’s hit To All the Boys movie franchise and its spinoff series XO, Kitty.
Combine that production infrastructure with Cooper’s massive, direct relationship with young female audiences, and you get the foundation for something much bigger than an audio network.
Today, Unwell includes:
- More than a dozen podcasts
- Film and television production
- Live events
- Consumer products
- A creative agency
Cooper says the company reaches around 70 million women every month.
Unwell’s biggest distribution partner remains SiriusXM. The 2024 agreement, worth up to $125 million over three years, wasn’t just a paycheck for Cooper to keep recording Call Her Daddy. It also gave SiriusXM advertising and distribution rights across Unwell’s full show lineup, including future programming and events.
The Company Has Been Expanding Fast
Unwell has announced a wave of projects well outside the podcast world.
The company is developing a series adaptation of Hannah Grace’s bestselling romance novel Icebreaker for Netflix, plus a film adaptation of Ali Hazelwood’s Deep End. It also has a Hulu adaptation of Aggie Blum Thompson’s mystery novel You Deserve to Know in the works, and a partnership with Google on the micro-drama project Moving On. Meanwhile, the podcast slate keeps growing too.
The plan for WTSL’s new capital is more of the same: further expansion, and potentially new acquisitions.
There’s already a sign Cooper is restructuring for this next phase. This week, reports confirmed Cooper is leaving talent agency UTA — the same agency that negotiated her SiriusXM deal — and moving to CAA. Sources close to Unwell say the company has spent recent months mapping out its next stage of growth following the WTSL deal, including rethinking its approach to talent representation.
Unwell reportedly now employs more than 100 people, working across podcasts, television, film, live events, consumer products, and advertising all at once.
That’s a dramatically different operation from the two-person podcast Cooper launched eight years ago.
Not Everything Has Been Smooth Sailing
Interestingly, this $500 million valuation lands during one of the more complicated stretches of Cooper’s public career.
Her Unwell beverage line, launched in partnership with Nestlé and sold through Target, is reportedly being discontinued after less than two years on shelves. The product range had expanded from hydration drinks into energy, protein, and focus products, but remaining inventory is expected to sell through this fall.
The company has also faced scrutiny over its workplace culture. A Vanity Fair investigation earlier this year included allegations from current and former employees about Kaplan’s management style, which Cooper has publicly disputed.
On top of that, Unwell’s relationship with creator Alix Earle — once one of the network’s biggest signings — ended when her Hot Mess podcast left the company.
From A Barstool Contract Fight To A $500 Million Business
There’s a genuinely remarkable full-circle story behind all of this.
Back in 2020, Cooper and original co-host Sofia Franklyn were locked in a public dispute with Dave Portnoy and Barstool Sports over their contracts and ownership of Call Her Daddy. Cooper made the decision to return to Barstool, continue the show without Franklyn, and secure a path toward owning the show’s intellectual property outright.
That single decision set off a chain reaction:
- It laid the groundwork for the $60 million Spotify deal.
- The Spotify deal helped build the foundation for Unwell.
- Unwell helped produce the $125 million SiriusXM agreement.
- And now, one of Hollywood’s most powerful investment firms has valued the company Cooper and Kaplan built at $500 million — before a single dollar of new money is even added.
Cooper started Call Her Daddy as a scrappy podcast. Eight years later, serious investors are treating the business she built around it like a full-fledged Hollywood media company.
EarlyMagazine UK will continue tracking Alex Cooper’s net worth and business moves as more financial details of the Unwell deal come to light.
