Mobile video served up in a multitude of highly appealing ways.

Moderator: Rajeev Chand, Rutberg & Company
Judges:
Microsoft
MobileCrunch
Orange

Companies:

ComVu
Focus: streams live video via the mobile phone
Funding: Self-financed
Enables 1-click video capture and sharing optimized for viewing. Server end has range of admin controls for rate of streaming, size of file, tagging capabilities, archiving, etc. Subscribers receive instant notification of the webcast via e-mail, SMS, or RSS, or SMS.
Business model: software licensing model to operators and portals. Will also do subscription fees and revenue sharing. Applicable for consumer and some vertical business segments as well.

Orange rolled out video blogging via MMS and had great market traction early on.

Juice Wirelesss
Focus: Pluggable 1-many, phone-to-web tool for capturing and sharing UGC (video, pictures, text and audio) and posting to JuiceCaster.com site,
other mobile phones, or range of profiles from any leading Social network sites (SNS).
Funding: Series B
Juice Wireless leverages user-behavior of having multiple SN profiles but ony 1 cellphone. One video on your cell is postable to one’s multiple profiles.
Business model: Mobile & video advertising biz model, targeting portals (AOL and others), carriers, etc.

In response to questions about their barrier to entry, Juice Wireless believes that its transcoding ease of use, first-mover advantage, and deals locked in with large operators in Europe and portals like AOL will help it capture demand and market share.

Nexage
Focus: Mobile TV software platform
Funding: Seed
Nexage simplifies integration, deployment, and usability issues due to the broad range of formats and standards. Phonecasts allow live TV, events and VoD. Mobile video solution on the phone using WAP browser. Platform allows for example an indie band to capture, create, and broadcast a live event. No client needs to be deployed on the phone and it works on all 3G phones. Targeting the 250 million subscribers for 3G phones in 2007. Competes against MobiTV, Quickplay, Theplatform, and Entriq. Nexage has a client-agnostic approach and is currently deployed on Sprint and Cingular. While 3G is not fully on the radar in the U.S., Nexage’s service is accessible to custmers globally and not limited to any geographic region.

Veeker
Focus: Instant video messaging
Funding:Seed
Video IM. Features include ability to tag, share, privacy controls, ability to title videos, and then post to a blog or SN profile. Over 70 million handsets in U.S. are MMS capable. Very specific function that is a messaging service: either 1-to-1 or 1-to-a-few.
Business model: Plan to partner with other websites and SNS to incorporate mobile video communication into their users’ experiences.