Archive for December, 2009

I’m one of those people who always think things are moving too slow and feel frustrated we’re not growing faster. But sometimes, when I take the time to look back, I realise I’m wrong. This is one of those moments.

Looking back at 2009

Last month Videoplaza turned 2 years old and considering most things happened this year, 2009 just must have been a great year. Looking at some key metrics – that I can share – this is the progress:

• From a simple and basic product to a stable, scalable and value creating product loved by our clients
• From a team of 6 in Stockholm to 15 employees in Stockholm, London and Paris
• From 5 clients in 1 market to 20 in 6 markets
• From losing money to breaking even in November!

Not only has it been a good year for us, it’s been a great year for online video in general. We see that across all the European markets. Many of the experimental projects are turning into real volume businesses, ad networks are getting up to speed, online video is getting its own media budgets etc.

Like most people blogging, I haven’t been as active as I’d wanted to be. Part of it is that I’m more busy now, part of it is the complexity of sharing information as the company grows. Transparency is one Videoplaza’s key values so I really hope we can get better at this next year. We believe it’s important to stay open and human. We believe that is the only way to create true trust and credibility.

What to expect from 2010

Having almost reached profitability last month, we are making huge investments on all areas in 2010 taking the company to the next phase. Below are some bullets on what to expect from us:

• Dramatic increase of the team from 15 to 30-35
• Moving into a new 425m2 office in March that we signed yesterday, (we have some spare space, interested?)
• Increase of our client list with major tier 1 publishers across Europe
• The launch of a partner programme to structure all of our valuable relationships in the video eco system
• Major improvements on all levels with the product – we’re doubling the dev team!
• Exciting stuff on the world of syndication and third party ad serving
• More and better integrations with video ad networks
• Experimental projects with new platforms such as the iPhone, IPTV, media centers etc.
• More research to better understand and prove the value of instream advertising – first part of that will be published in Q1
• Happier and more profitable clients

With this blog post I’m now ready to close the lid of my Macbook and start my holiday.

Best wishes from me and the Videoplaza team from a white Stockholm!

The photo is from my kitchen window if you wonder :)

When at Streaming Media Europe a month ago or so, our CEO Sorosh Tavakoli was interviewed by Intruders.tv. The interview, that I think is actually one of the better with him, is now available online. It covers among many things the story on how Videoplaza came about and how we help publishers monetise online video.

Enjoy!

It’s crazy over here at Videoplaza. In a good way. Things are simply taking off.

With a product that is maturing, with explosive growth of online video consumption (and ad revenues) and a really positive outlook for the year to come: We feel that we need to shift gears and take Videoplaza to the next level.

We have a leading position on in-stream video ad serving in Europe. In just two years, we’ve grown to be 15 people in three countries. We have about 20 clients in five markets and the overall inventory is growing exponentially.

But with the pace things are happening now, we simply have to ramp up. 2010 is the year when Videoplaza will conquer Europe and to keep up with bold words like that, we need to expand – big time.

Let me just cut the bs and tell you this:

• We are recruiting 10 new Videoplaza rock-stars before the end of Q1 2010.
• 6 of these positions are developer roles described here. The others are for sales and admin, please drop us a line if you’re interested.
• Already now, our office is completely cramped. So we’re moving our headquarters to a new Stockholm location (TBA) – more than three times the size of our current.

With this push we’re confident that we will keep (and extend) our lead on in-stream video ad serving. We are the domain experts and intend to remain the best at what we do.

To achieve that, we can work with nothing less than the best people available. Finding 10 of those in one push is obviously going to be a challenge, so please help us out and spread the word.

Thanks!