Calgary firm takes Canadian lead in offering content on multiple screens; targeting broadcasters next

Calgary-based MoboVivo has snagged a lucrative deal to distribute the award-winning prime time hit show The Tudors for iPod, iPhone, BlackBerry and laptop users simultaneously. Ranked third behind iTunes and Amazon in terms of downloads, the move cements MoboVivo’s dominance of the Internet video distribution sector in Canada. CEO and co-founder Trevor Doerksen says the business model of distributing video on the Internet and on multiple devices has proven to be successful, since companies like Apple first pioneered it a couple of years ago. He says the market will continue to be strong for video distribution companies as more consumers adapt watching content on multiple screens. “In the next short while here, we are going to see a lot of evidence that bundling screens is going to be a really powerful message to the industry and the consumers that they get to watch their content on their screens, ” he says. Yet even as profits are expected to hold steady for companies distributing video online, there is no guarantee the big names will continue dominating the market. Doerksen sees broadcasters, cable companies and content producers jumping in to take control of the video film supply chain by becoming distributers themselves instead of outsourcing content to third parties. “Ultimately though, we believe that broadcasters are going to do that themselves. Broadcasters are going to say listen we are going to take back or control some of the supply chain.” Doerksen says this calls for a rethink and exploration of new business avenues for companies like MoboVivo. “We are positioning ourselves to be more of an enabler than just a consumer website that offers items. We’d like to license our technology including our trans-coding technology to the broadcasters, cable companies, telephone companies, content owners and aggregators,” he says. All signs show MoboVivo has been arming itself for the future by bolstering its research and development capabilities. In November last year, it attracted $1 million in funding from the Alberta-based venture capital firm, AVAC Ltd. The investment comes from AVAC’s capacity builder program, which is designed to help tech companies in Alberta market products and entice commercial investment. In May this year, it received $50,000 for R&D from the Alberta Innovation Pilot Voucher Program, which helps Alberta entrepreneurs develop and commercialize innovative technologies. Last October, MoboVivo prototyped a cloud computing-based approach to doing trans-coding, a move which will allow it to reach more platforms more seamlessly. In two weeks, the beta version of the prototype will be unveiled to an audience of European, American and Canadian cloud and grid computing experts in the Open Grid forum in Banff. “R&D has led directly to some of our new product announcements and the ability to hit more devices,” says Doerksen, adding that ultimately, MoboVivo hopes to enhance its video delivery technology so it can begin licensing it to broadcasters content producers. In the meantime, broadcasters haven’t adopted the business models espoused by companies like MoboVivo, Apple’s iTunes, and Amazon. However, that hasn’t dissuaded them from experimenting. “But what we hear is that successful experiments may convince them that they need to do some of this stuff themselves,” says Doerksen.

Calgary firm takes Canadian lead in offering content on multiple screens; targeting broadcasters next

Broadcast | October 6, 2009

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