ABC-Disney Opens Slightly More: Syndicating Full Shows To Veoh, To Buy More Traffic
This story was written by Rafat Ali.
ABC, among the most conservative of online players when it comes to syndicating its own TV shows (but among the most progressive in putting shows within its own branded environment, along with parent Disney), has done its second major video deal: it has done a deal with Veoh, where full episodes of prime time shows like "Lost," "Desperate Housewives" and "Ugly Betty," along with short clips and game highlights from ESPN (NYSE: DIS). This is the second such deal from the company after its deal last year with AOL.
In this new deal, ABC will pay Veoh based on the traffic it send to the ABC.com site. Also, Veoh will use the ABC media player (with its high quality video through Move Networks) to show ABC and ESPN programming on its site.
The company is also considering other distribution deals with sites like YouTube and Hulu. Veoh, backed by former Disney CEO Michael Eisner (which makes this new deal slightly ironic), recently received a big $30 million round of funding. Veoh hopes the deal will help position it as a hub for all full-length TV shows..it has some shows from CBS (NYSE: CBS) and MTV as well.
By Rafat Ali