Reach announcement*
Blackbird plc
(the "Company")
elevate.io releases subtitles and transcriptions
23 January 2026, London, Blackbird plc (AIM: BIRD), the developer of the browser-based collaborative video editing platform elevate.io, today announces the launch of subtitles and transcriptions within elevate.io, the latest in a series of rapid product releases.
Subtitles and transcriptions are central to video workflows with industry studies reporting up to 85% of social media videos are watched without sound*. Creators increasingly rely on captions to ensure accessibility, higher engagement and clear messaging.
This product upgrade is part of elevate.io's broader mission to reduce video production cycles from weeks to hours through a fundamentally new approach to collaborative video creation. By making integrated services, such as subtitles and transcriptions, available in the browser, elevate.io removes traditional bottlenecks in the production process. This follows the recent announcement of the Company's partnership with Epidemic Sound, which will see Epidemic Sound's music library directly integrated into the elevate.io platform during the first quarter of 2026.
Commenting on the product upgrade, Ian McDonough, Executive Chairman of Blackbird plc, said: "Adding subtitles and transcriptions is a massive leap forward and they are a significant part of a much bigger story. We are reducing video production timelines from weeks to same-day sign-off by delivering a platform that allows teams to create video together, review in real time and solve multiple existing pain points."
Sumit Rai, Chief Product Officer and co-founder of elevate.io, commented: "Moving beyond traditional "last-step" subtitle workflows, where transcription is added only after an edit is complete, elevate.io links transcriptions directly to the source media. This makes subtitles fully editable throughout the entire editing lifecycle."
Users are able to utilise tokens, which were introduced in Q4 2025, to include subtitles in their elevate.io workflows. This will provide users with an easy way to obtain the service and elevate.io with a mechanism to monetise the usage.
* see https://www.magisto.com/reports/videos-without-sound
Contacts:
Blackbird plc Tel: +44 (0)20 8879 7245
Ian McDonough, Executive Chairman
Caroline Steiner, Director of Communications
Allenby Capital Limited (Nominated Adviser and Broker) Tel: +44 (0)20 3328 5656
Nick Naylor / Piers Shimwell (Corporate Finance)
Amrit Nahal (Equity Sales and Corporate Broking)
About Blackbird plc
Blackbird plc operates in the fast-growing SaaS, Media and Entertainment and content creation markets. Blackbird plc's patented technology allows for frame accurate navigation, playback, viewing and editing in the cloud and it has two products.
BlackbirdⓇ a market leading suite of cloud-native computing applications, is used by rights holders, broadcasters, sports and news video specialists, live events and content owners, post production houses, other mass market digital video channels and corporations.
elevate.io is the company's new browser-based collaborative content creation platform currently in general release. elevate.io is built using Blackbird's core technology and is aimed at professional teams and the fast growing Creator Economy.
Blackbird plc also licences its core video technology, under its 'Powered by Blackbird' licensing model, enabling video companies to accelerate their path to true cloud business models.
www.blackbirdplc.com
www.elevate.io
www.blackbird.video
www.linkedin.com/company/blackbird-cloud
www.twitter.com/blackbirdcloud
www.facebook.com/blackbirdplc
www.youtube.com/c/blackbirdcloud
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This is a Reach announcement. Reach is an investor communication service aimed at assisting listed and unlisted (including AIM quoted) companies to distribute media only / non-regulatory news releases into the public domain. Information required to be notified under the AIM Rules for Companies, Market Abuse Regulation or other regulation would be disseminated as an RNS regulatory announcement and not on Reach.