Broadband TV, a Vancouver-based media and technology company that helps businesses to monetize their fan uploaded Youtube content, has reached 1 billion monthly impressions to its content.
The company is one of the largest multi-channel networks (MCN) on Youtube, and now boasts more than 100 million subscribers from over 10,000 content partners, an increase of 2,200 content partners in two months.
“With growth comes increased competition and we’re looking forward to showing the market how we are different,” said CEO Shahrzad Rafati. “Our proprietary technology platform benefits content creators of all sizes and we have a compelling road map of features that we can’t wait to release to make our content creator community even more successful.”
We’re aware that quote was extremely vague, but we can tell you that Broadband TV is a very big fish in the global video content space. Most of its success seems to be coming from Europe, where Rafati closed a major partnership and investment contribution in June with RTL Group, Europe’s largest media conglomerate. The $36 million investment was the largest private placement into an Internet media company in Canada since 2007.
Now it looks like the company is chugging full steam ahead, and the metrics are following.
Founded in 2005 at the start of the “Youtube revolution”, BroadbandTV drives success for online video creators by leveraging its proprietary technology and massive online reach. Rafati was recognized by Fast Company as one of the 100 most creative people in business. According to wikipedia, she is known for “pioneering both the technology and business model that made peace between big entertainment entities like the NBA and their fans, who were uploading premium content to video sites like YouTube.”
Broadband TVs multi-channel network on Youtube (over 20 channels) works with a number of big-name brands like the NBA, Discovery and A&E, helping those companies to generate significant revenues from their fan uploaded content. The company helps put ownership and control of that content without disrupting the communities that the fans have built around it. In other words, it helps large companies to make money off of fan-generated content, instead of punishing them for uploading videos of their favourite athlete, for example.
If a Maple Leafs fan uploads a video of a big goal, Broadband TV can scour the web for that video and rebrand it as official NHL content, and then monetize that content with advertisements. Before, brands may have looked at that user-uploaded content as a form of piracy, since many professional sports leagues technically own any content shot at its events.
An Iranian-Canadian, Rafati has publicly stated that the company’s mission is to help global unemployment by fostering job creation and entrepreneurship, and actively encourages social change. She is the founder of VISO Give, the first online channel that allows viewers to donate to charities by watching YouTube videos about them. As well, Rafati is also the co-founder of the world’s first Chopra Yoga in partnership with Dr. Deepak Chopra.