MUMBAI: Dragonfly, an Internet video distribution provider, announced it has closed over $3 million in funding to date from a group of strategic individual investors. Dragonfly is using this investment to enhance its world-class multimedia content delivery network. In the coming months, the company will be looking to build out its partner network in an effort to more quickly integrate and monetize high-quality HD video into additional portals and platforms.
Dragonfly’s investment comes at a time when the online video market is exploding. With the streaming video market estimated at $1.38 billion in 2007 and growing, bringing affordable, turnkey video solutions to market is a high priority among businesses looking to take advantage of this fast-growing market. Recognizing that higher-quality video content is going to create deeper revenue streams, companies are looking for video solutions that are easy to produce, optimize, manage and monetize.
Additionally, the model for video distribution is changing too as more businesses opt out of using traditional low-res YouTube-like videos and turn to higher-quality videos. With the goal of keeping viewers engaged on Web sites for longer periods of time, these businesses are seeing that the stickiness of better quality keeps viewers engaged longer and thereby increases revenue streams.
Previously, the primary drawback of producing high-quality, long-form video online was the often cost-prohibitive expense of building out a video network to showcase these videos. Using Dragonfly’s flagship product, Movie Maker, companies can publish, track, monetize and analyze video on their Web sites using Dragonfly’s turnkey, low-cost platform. With Dragonfly, businesses don’t have to invest in expensive video networks, so they can quickly and affordably bring fresh content to market. Dragonfly is also working with its partner network to create video portals for trade associations looking to bring their membership together on the Web for revenue sharing opportunities.
Guy Nouri, founder and CEO of Dragonfly, as well as an early pioneer in video technology, explained that in this frenzied video environment where content providers are eager to get high-quality video streamed to viewers, video quality, performance, viewer analytics and affordability are "make or break" components in a delivery strategy.
"Not only is the market growing dramatically, but there’s a seminal transformation underway today as content providers look to improve the online viewer experience by featuring their content in full screen HD," he said. "With Dragonfly’s technology, we are improving video quality on any device and wrapping in advanced analytics and metrics at an affordable price. For the mid-tier business market, this is a significant advancement. Our customers have access to high-quality, full screen, HD video without spending millions of dollars on a video network."
Dragonfly Movie Maker gives companies superior control, tools, management and analytical capabilities to deal with the technical complexities associated with moving large media libraries onto the Internet.
