Online video platform company Brightcove turned a profit for the first time earlier this year and is growing revenue 50% each year thanks in part to an expansion strategy that reaches past the media industry.
The big opportunity in online video lies beyond the TV and media world as organizations, corporations and brands of all shapes and sizes turn to Web video as a communications tool, Brightcove CEO Jeremy Allaire told Beet.TV during an exclusive interview in San Francisco at the Brightcove Alliance event earlier this month.
Brightcove launched in 2004, landing early TV customers such as Viacom and A&E.
Now, nearly every TV network, show and studio has established an online video presence, so platform providers need to expand their customer base. "We first built our business with premium media publishers who were
investing in online video to generate a new revenue stream," Allaire said. "What we
have really seen recently is corporations and organizations investing in video as a fundamental way to market and communicate," he said, adding that the majority of new business coming into Brightcove is from non-media companies.
That includes organizations like the AARP, quick service restaurants like Chipotle and tech giants like Sun Microsystems.
Earlier this month, the blogosphere was buzzing about a possible Google acquisition of Brightcove, rumors Allaire dispelled in a paidContent article saying the company is not for sale. In that story, he also noted that staff cutbacks late last year and reductions in marketing and travel expenditures helped the company achieve profitability this year.
Also, earlier this month Brightcove expanded its partner program to now include more than 200 technology partners that can hook into the Brightcove system. "When you have independent software services building on top that creates more value for our customers because they know the rest of the industry works with it. It's about lowering costs and decreasing the risk," Allaire explained to Beet.TV. With the partner program, customers can add additional features to their video players from Brightcove's partners like Apture and JS-Kit.
Daisy Whitney, Senior Producer
Disclaimer: Brightcove is a sponsor of Beet.TV
