Joost, the failed video venture started by Skype founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennström, was put out of its misery in November 2009 when Adconion Media Group decided to pick up the remains of the company for an undisclosed sum.
Today, the international audience and content network operator is launching a suite of online video advertising products and services, targeting agencies and brand marketers who might be interested in running in-banner and in-stream video advertising on the Joost Video Network.
Video destination site Joost.com, meanwhile, will remain up and running (gotta love that ‘beta’ tagged logo) and will be used as a portal to showcase and distribute branded entertainment content.
Here’s how Nick Higgins, director of global video at Adconion, pitches the new offering:
“Adding this product offering gives Adconion a distinguished position among ad networks, as we are the only provider with in-banner and in-stream capabilities; an exclusive relationship with a branded entertainment studio; in-house creative services; and a video portal, Joost.com, that we own, operate and sell exclusively.”
Adconion stresses that this is the first product from the combined entity formed when Adconion acquired Joost’s assets. Since then, Adconion has integrated its ad server with the Joost video player and is the exclusive video ad provider for Joost.com and the Joost video player in its embedded form. Adconion also touts its exclusive relationship with the RedLever studio for the content side of the equation. The two companies say that will work with agencies and marketers to develop fresh content, from advertisements to webisodes.
According to the press release, the Joost Video Network will serve video ads on Adconion’s network, which self-reportedly spans 2,000 premium publishers in more than 70 markets worldwide. Adconion claims it is capable of reaching more than 350 million unique users across the globe.
All in all, it seems like Adconion made a good move by throwing Joost a lifeline, though I’d love to know what they ended up paying for the assets of the massively hyped venture.