Widevine to grow with new $15 million venture round |
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It was almost a month ago that we reported on the latest financing activities of Seattle-based Widevine, a story that generated plenty of discussion here at TechFlash. At the time, CEO Brian Baker said a more detailed financing announcement would be forthcoming. Well, that day is here with Widevine disclosing that Liberty Global -- the international cable company -- Samsung Ventures -- the venture arm of the South Korean electronics giant -- and a third undisclosed company have led a $15 million investment in the company. [Post updated with comments from Baker]
Widevine helps companies securely deliver online video to televisions, Blu-ray players, mobile devices, gaming systems and other electronics. It is playing a key behind-the-scenes role in the concept of "TV Everywhere" -- the idea that you can watch television programming on any Internet-connected device.
It is a big bet, one that Widevine is going after with its new war chest. In fact, the 10-year-old company has been well-funded over the years.
Since the 50-person company recapitalized in 2003, it has raised a total of $51.8 million. Past investors include Cisco, Charter Ventures, Constellation Ventures, Dai Nippon Printing Co.,VantagePoint Venture Partners and others.
“Widevine will use the additional capital to support and grow our customer base, broaden our product portfolio and defend our intellectual property,” said Baker in a statement. “We are thrilled with the validation of our business, technology and markets provided by these industry leaders.”
Widevine wouldn't disclose the third corporate investor in this latest round of capital, though a quote in the press release from media analyst Ralph Schackart gives a little clue. In the release, Schackart said the "simultaneous investment of the world’s largest consumer electronics manufacturer, second largest cable operator and second largest satellite provider is a tremendously compelling endorsement of Widevine..."
The two largest satellite TV providers in the U.S. are DirecTV -- the biggest with 18.4 million customers -- and Dish Network -- which calls itself the fastest-growing pay TV service in America with more than 14 million customers.
UPDATE I: A source with knowledge of the deal confirmed that Echostar -- which is the technology partner of Dish Network -- is the undisclosed investor.
UPDATE II: Widevine CEO Brian Baker said that he wasn't actually looking for money when the strategic partners emerged earlier this year. One of those partners -- Samsung -- has already committed to delivering Widevine's adaptive streaming and DRM software in 100 million television sets and Blu-ray players in 2010.
Baker called that partnership a key alliance for Widevine, making it one of the company's top five customers.
With the new capital in place, Baker said the company is in a strong financial position. In fact, the company has bounced in and out of profitability in 2009.
"We were smart in that we right sized the company in August 2008," he said. "We anticipated that there was going to be a coming market collapse, and we said: 'let's be proactive.' That put us in a position to get profitable and run at break even."
Baker said that the market is finally starting to emerge to deliver "high quality" digital media to connected devices. In fact, the company plans to announce another deal this week with Blockbuster to help the video store chain securely deliver movies and TV shows to Internet-enabled devices.
I also had the chance to ask Baker about competition from Nagravision as one of the readers suggested in the comments below.
Baker said that Widevine competes against Nagravision in its legacy business, but not in the newly-emerging sector of delivering online video to connected consumer devices. "The key strategic focus for us is the Internet video and the TV Everywhere strategy," he said. "I am sure that Nagravision would love to be able to figure out how to participate in that market segment, but that is not an area where we compete with them today."
John Cook is co-founder of TechFlash. Follow on Twitter @johnhcook.
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