Video Collaboration Startup Frame.io Raises $2.2M

Frame.io, a startup that improves the collaboration process around video production, is announcing that it has raised a $2.2 million seed round led by Accel Partners.

Co-founder and CEO Emery Wells previously worked in video post-production, and he said Frame.io emerged from his own frustrations about the tools available when he needed to work with clients, team members and other collaborators.

On a typical project, you could share media files via Dropbox, Box or Hightail, but they don’t offer a great video-viewing experience, so might end up posting videos privately on YouTube or Vimeo. Bt even then, Wells said, “Communicating in a static email sucks; you just end up with a mess of links.” (His complaints rang true with my experience working on TechCrunch videos and other projects.)

With Frame.io, you can upload video, photo and audio files; view the files in your browser; compare different versions; leave time-stamped annotations and comments; and even draw directly on the video or image.

Since launching earlier this year, Wells said Frame.io has been used by more than 26,000 businesses. And while many customers come from the media industry, he said he’s also realized that video collaboration is important to a wide range of customers. The ones listed on the Frame.io website include Facebook, Nike, Yale University, Refinery29 and BBC.

The new funding will allow Frame.io to continue growing its team (currently nine people). Wells said his vision is not just to offer a standalone collaborative product, but also to build “the connective tissue” between all your media production tools. In fact, Frame.io has already built a desktop app that connects with FinalCut Pro.

“You don’t just use FinalCut, you use 10 different apps when you’re making stuff, and none of them really talk to each other,” Wells said.

Besides Accel, investors in the seed round include Signal Fire, Jared Leto, Funders Guild, Thomas Hesse (former president of Sony Music), InVision founder Clark Valberg, ZenCoder founder, Jon Dahl and Walter Kortschak of Summit Partners.