Kaltura Launches "Virtual Marketplace" for Broadband Video Applications

At the NAB show in Las Vegas, Wednesday, Kaltura, a company that offers what it bills as the first open source broadband video platform, launched the "Kaltura Exchange" (http://exchange.kaltura.com), which it bills as a "virtual marketplace" where video publishers, developers, technology companies and service providers can share and trade in video applications and services connected to the Kaltura platform. According to the company, the Kaltura Exchange, which is currently in beta, is the first service of its kind in the video space, and will connect developers and service providers to publishers, value-added resellers and system integrators looking to expand upon the core Kaltura platform. The company says that the Exchange includes plug-ins, extensions, applications, and solutions at all layers of the video stack, including ingestion, transcoding, management, metadata extraction, SEO, publishing, monetization and analytics.

A number of technology partners and developers have already added their solutions to the Kaltura Exchange, including Adap.tv, Tremor Media, TubeMogul, PLYmedia, Artivision, MindTouch, Taboola, YuMe, LiveU, HD Cloud, Awoga, VideoMarket7, encoding.com, 3Play Media, rtCamp, TikiWiki, and Microstudi. "We are very excited about the Kaltura Exchange as it really presents a cataclysmic shift in the way video apps are built and deployed," Kaltura chairman and CEO, Ron Yekutiel, said in a prepared statement. "Our open source platform is the glue that patches together innovation from all around the world into one accessible, flexible, and interoperable offering. I'm thrilled to see what amazing castles can be built from this new Lego framework for online video." Added Kaltura's VP of business and community development, Shay David: "With its open source video framework, Kaltura has made the video application development lifecycle extremely easy and cost-effective. The Kaltura Exchange facilitates a convenient and simple-to-use marketplace where publishers can find new apps and services to enhance their video experience, and developers and service providers can promote and generate revenue from their apps, services and unique expertise. Kaltura is bringing the power of distributed development to the world of video, similar to what Salesforce.com brought to the CRM space and the iPhone store brought to mobile. This is a defining moment for online video platforms."

According to Kaltura, applications in the new Exchange are organized into several categories, including skins, themes and language packs, plug-ins for the Kaltura video player, remixer and other video tools, client libraries in different programming languages, and standalone widgets and apps. Sample apps in the Exchange include a subtitles and captioning app from PLYmedia, an advertising app from Adap.tv, the Kaltura Joomla Video Extension app, a Google Analytics app, and a TubeMogul syndication app. Many of the apps are free, Kaltura says, and include source code; however, developers can also choose to charge service fees and license terms where relevant, according to the company.

On April 21st at 2:00PM Eastern, Kaltura will be partnering with TubeMogul and 3Play Media on a free webinar entitled "Introducing the Kaltura Exchange." Interested parties can register for it here.