Internet TV biz news: Hulu acquire Chinese startup?; Veoh gets new heavyweight investors

HuluWhile it’s yet-to-be confirmed, TechCrunch reports that News Corp. and NBC’s joint venture, Hulu, has made its first acquisition: Bejing-based startup Mojiti. It’s thought that Mojiti, an online video platform that enables users to annotate videos at specific time points (while also forming the basis for search functionality) will provide a part of the technology used to power Hulu. Mojiti founder, Eric Feng, was previously at Microsoft Research Asia.

TechCrunch editor, Mike Arrington, expresses surprise that Hulu would go outside for some of its core technology, while conceding that, having missed their previously announced launch date of summer 2007, an acquisition could get things back on track.

VeohTVVeoh, the company behind the video sharing site of the same name, as well as the Internet TV app, VoehTV (see our review), have announced a new set of funders. Joining ex-Disney CEO, Michael Eisner, along with Shelter Capital Partners, Spark Capital, and Time Warner Investments, Veoh’s backers now also include former Viacom and MTV Networks CEO Tom Freston’s Firefly3 and Jonathan Dolgen, former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Viacom Entertainment Group.

That’s a pretty heavyweight media lineup, with plenty of Hollowood/TV network connections, which, moving forward, is likely to be a prerequisite for companies in the Internet TV space whose success will in part be based on their ability to secure major content deals. In this respect, VeohTV competitor, Joost, looks particularly well placed with backing from CBS and Viacom.

last100 is edited by Steve O'Hear. Aside from founding last100, Steve is co-founder and CEO of Beepl and a freelance journalist who has written for numerous publications, including TechCrunch, The Guardian, ZDNet, ReadWriteWeb and Macworld, and also wrote and directed the Silicon Valley documentary, In Search of the Valley. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.

Leave a Reply