VideoNuze Posts

mPortal is an 11 year-old mobile content discovery company, which has recently announced its Springboard Media product for TV everywhere applications on multiple devices. In this NABShow interview, Fady talks about how the product fits into content providers' and pay-TV operators' work flow enabling them to deploy and dynamically change content in apps distributed to multiple devices. I described the product more in a recent post. See the video below (6 minutes, 32 seconds).

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After a golden period of scorching growth from 2010 to mid-2011, Netflix has been on a rocky road since, to say the least. While subscriber growth re-started modestly in Q1, the company reported its first loss in years. True, you can't "drive while looking in the rear-view mirror," but it is intriguing to think about where Netflix might be today had it done 5 (or maybe more) things differently. Here are my top 5 "what-ifs" to consider:

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I visited the SeaWell Networks booth at the recent NABShow and got a demo of their new network-based ad insertion capabilities from CEO Brian Collie. SeaWell's Spectrum technology helps service providers manage delivery of adaptive bit rate (ABR) streams to multiple devices, in partnership with ARRIS. At the NABShow, Brian demo'd how Spectrum can dynamically and seamlessly insert ads into video based on an individual user's behavior. SeaWell just completed an $8 million financing. See video below (5 minutes, 43 seconds).

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Early-bird discounted registration is now available for the VideoNuze 2012 Online Video Advertising Summit on Tues, June 19th in NYC. Sign up now and save up to $170 (almost 30%) off the standard rate.

The Online Video Ad Summit is going to be an exciting day of learning and networking for industry professionals, including panel discussions, fireside chats, research presentations, best practices case studies and technology demos. Speakers include executives from GroupM, Google/YouTube, The Wall Street Journal Digital Network, LG Electronics, CBS Interactive, Macy's, eMarketer, American Express, Digitas, VivaKi and others still to be announced. If you're a content provider, advertiser, agency, technology or other ecosystem executive, this will be premier opportunity to gain first-hand insight in the rapidly-evolving online video ad industry.

The Summit is generously supported by Title sponsors Auditude/Adobe and YuMe along with Adap.tv, Innovid, Collective, Conviva, Eyeview, Mixpo, TubeMogul, VideoHub, Videology and LiveRail. We'll also have a fun door prize drawing sponsored by Jivox.

Save now with early-bird registration!

(Note, the VideoNuze 2012 Online Video Advertising Summit takes the place of last year's "ELEVATE" event).

As a warm-up to the Summit, join VideoNuze, TubeFilter and FourScreen Media for our complimentary Multi-Screen Mix-Up next Wed, May 16th at Copia from 6:30-8:30. Jim Louderback, CEO of Revision3 (which was just acquired by Discovery) will be our speaker. And we will be doing a drawing for 5 attendees to win free tickets to the Summit.

Elemental Technologies, which has developed an innovative GPU-based video processing technology, has raised a $13 million Series C round led by Norwest Venture Partners, to fund international and product expansion. Total financing raised to date is $29.6 million. Elemental's CEO and co-founder Sam Blackman told me yesterday that the company racked up "8-digits" in revenues last year, up from "7-digits" in the two prior years, and has been close to being cash flow positive for the last couple of quarters.

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Following its success helping leading marketers distribute video and other rich media messages to mobile devices, Mogreet is now looking to do the same for individuals, with its recently launched moShare service. moShare distinguishes itself from other social platforms in that the video or rich media being shared is sent via a text message to the recipient's mobile device, with content formatted specifically for viewing or playback on it. 

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Eric Elia, Brightcove's VP, TV Solutions came by the VideoNuze booth at the recent NABShow and explained what he sees as the "third phase of TV transformation." Eric believes companies like Amazon, Netflix, Apple and others are helping make it "OK to put a dollar euro sign in front of content." Brightcove has seen a huge surge of interest from aggregators and content providers in providing paid services.

Eric also shares insight about how cable TV networks are beginning to embrace content distribution via apps, a big change from just a year ago. Eric cites the catalyst for this as the launch of apps from Comcast and Time Warner Cable, which have signaled to networks that it's acceptable to distribute this way, as long as the billing relationship, via authentication, remains intact.

At the NABShow, Brightcove announced its "paywall solution framework" and support for Google's Widevine DRM.  Sample applications for connected TVs. See video below (13 minutes, 35 seconds)

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I'm pleased to be joined once again by Colin Dixon, senior partner at The Diffusion Group, for the 131st edition of the VideoNuze Report podcast, for May 4, 2012. This week Colin and I discuss how fundamental battle lines have been drawn between the traditional TV ecosystem vs. the numerous digital outlets that are launching online-only original programs. To be more specific, the former group seems intent on erecting ever-higher paywalls to access its programs, which is in turn opening up a gigantic opportunity for free, ad-supported programs to be provided by the latter group. How this battle unfolds will have far-reaching and profound implications for everyone involved.

For the traditional TV ecosystem, there appear to be two core drivers at work; first, the desire by broadcast TV networks to morph themselves into cable TV networks, and second, the role that TV Everywhere is taking on as a foundation of paywall economics.

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