Silicon Valley based Ooyala, a service that manages video streaming for websites, hit an important milestone last month – positive cash flow. The company was founded by ex Googlers Bismarck Lepe, Sean Knapp and Belsasar Lepe in 2007 and has raised just $10 million in funding.
And now they’re considering the hire of a new CEO, we’ve confirmed. Bismarck Lepe, the current CEO, says he’s actually been looking for his replacement for the last year. This isn’t being driven by the venture investor, Sierra Ventures, he says. And in fact the founding team retains stock and board of directors voting control, making their consent a requirement of any CEO change. Lepe just feels as though he isn’t necessarily the guy to take the company to the next level, whatever that may be. So he’s retained a search firm to find someone better than him to run Ooyala.
The company is certainly doing well. We first covered them in late 2008 and they already had big name customers like National Geographic, TV Guide, AOL, and Warner Brothers. Today, Lepe says, they stream 250,000 – 350,000 hours of video a day through partners. One Michael Jackson video last week racked up 70 million views in just 36 hours.
The company has a software as a service model that charges users to set up accounts and manage video. There is an additional fee based on hours of content streamed as well.
This is a crowded space. Brightcove has raised nearly $100 million in capital, for example. Yahoo paid $160 million to acquire competitor Maven Networks and then killed the business line 17 months later. And most recently Joost announced a strategic shift to focus on this space as well.
“Only” 10 million in funding since 2007 ? Poor dears, however did they do without their Ferraris and massages in custom-built Aeron chairs ?
Too cute for the room, stupid company names are destined for failure.
Good. Excellent.
This again makes me wonder about the move that Joost made. The level of competition, the sums needed to compete, and the speed of the sectors creative destruction.
Happy for Ooyala, worried about Joost.
Well online streaming is the next big thing, still there are too many player so now content will make a big difference in day to go.
uhm, can someone check out if gmail is working ? its down in india :\
Cash flow positive is something I didn’t expect to see from (m)any companies in this niche. As each is chasing after the anticipation of greater content hunger I’m expecting to see attrition though funding issues vs. any actual competitive differentiation.
Trying to tell apart magnify, delve, maven, kaltura, etc… etc… gets into the stuff of minutia.
Has TC considered a comparison chart in similarly grouped companies on CrunchBase?
companies are so secretive about this data that it’s almost not worth tracking. like valuations on venture rounds.
so does the “cash flow positive statement” on Ooyala come from reliable source – or is that statement attributed to B. Lepe.
Fliqz is a *way* better service and has hundreds more customers than these guys. They do it without lots of PR and flash. Classy team there.
That’s the way to do it.
Amen. That is the way to do it.
As an executive of the company, my raison de vivre is to increase shareholder value. One of the things that we’ve done from day one is make sure that we have the right people in the right roles. As a founding group – that retains control of the company – it’s even more important to make sure that we’re not managing the company with our egos. So… we’re always keeping an eye out for a person who may be able to do a better job (for all roles). For now, the board, the team and the shareholders are very happy with the results that we’ve posted. So for the foreseeable future – the team is stuck with me. I mean, last time I checked, we were still not quite as big as Google. (http://members....7/0702/028.html)
Bismarck-”the right people in the right roles”
Appreciate the culture here , kudos to the Ooyala team and good luck !!
Sampath
Twitter:@sampathmanda
Bismarck,
What everyone in the industry is saying about you is apparently true. How can you stand being so arrogant? On top of it all, posting a link to a story about how much money you made? Switching CEOs is probably a good call…
If a CEO of a company is not arrogant I would be worried.
Anonymous,
I haven’t met too many overly arrogant CEO’s, with support from the board and shareholders, who are willing to step aside if they find someone who’s more qualified to run the company. How is this a sign of arrogance?
Bismarck,
What everyone in the industry is saying about you is apparently true. How can you stand being so arrogant? On top of it all, posting a link to a story about how much money you made? Switching CEOs is probably a good call…
I know Bismarck, one of his investors and we are business partners with Ooyala.
He has always impressed me as a very grounded, pragmatic and insightful leader. I great CEO hires the right people and knows when to check their ego at the door. Founders syndrome is the killer of all great ideas and share holder value. Bismark demonstrates all the characteristics of a great leader…. Period!
The best CEO’s know their limits and hire good operators who can take the company to the next level. Google, Starbucks and many other great brand are examples of this strategy.
Bismarck congratulations on a job well done on less funding than any other video company in the industry.
“Anonymous Coward” please stop wasting everyone’s time with you idiotic antagonistic and useless comments.
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KIT Digital is the clear leader in the space. Not only are they the only listed company in the space (NASDAQ KITD) but they were the first in the space to a go cash flow positive.
Their sales beat Brightcove and dwarf the revenues of Ooyala.
They are the clear leader Internationally and broadened their footstep in the US with the recent purchase of The FeedRoom.