Verizon, continuing to strengthen its ability to deliver mobile video content, has purchased EdgeCast, a Southern California-based content delivery network (CDN). EdgeCast supports thousands of servers that can quickly adjust to traffic spikes and counts Twitter, Pinterest, Yahoo and WordPress among its 6,000 customers.
The deal is valued around $350 million, TechCrunch reported Dec. 8, and Verizon expects it to close in early 2014. The boards of both companies have already approved the deal.
“Verizon Digital Media Services will integrate EdgeCast complementary capabilities to further improve and increase its ability to meet the exponential growth in online digital media content, as well as broaden its portfolio of site acceleration services for digital enterprises,” Verizon said in a Dec. 9 statement.
In July, Digital Media Services announced the launch of Verizon Live Events, an online video service for broadcasters and content retailers, with video-streaming partner Origin Digital. Live Events can acquire an event feed, including satellite, terrestrial fiber and Internet feeds, and then “transcode and deliver the content to broadcasters and other commercial customers,” Verizon said in a July 8 statement.
In November, Verizon brought more of its video-support services in-house, with the acquisition of upLynk, a cloud-based company that “simplifies the complex issues content owners face by streamlining the process of uploading and encoding TV Everywhere for live, linear and video on-demand content,” it said in a Nov. 13 statement.
Bob Toohey, president of Verizon Digital Media Services, added to that statement, “Simply put, this acquisition provides intelligent, scalable and more flexible ways of streaming video for our customers.”
In its statement this morning, Verizon said that the “combination of complementary capabilities from Verizon, upLynk and EdgeCast further boosts performance of Verizon Digital Media Services’ end-to-end services.”
The Deloitte Technology Fast 500 ranked EdgeCast as the number-one fastest-growing Internet company in 2012, and in 2013, it ranked among the top 100 fastest-growing companies in the technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences and clean technology markets, based on revenue growth.
“Having journeyed from startup to technology leader in seven short years, the time is right for EdgeCast to elevate itself again by joining Verizon to continue our innovation and growth,” Edgecast CEO and Chairman Alex Kazerani, said in a statement.
Verizon, during its 2013 fiscal third quarter, posted revenue of $30.3 billion and an operating income of $7.1 billion.
“Our industry has a very healthy, competitive environment, and we are forecasting continued strong demand for our video and broadcast [businesses] across multiple networks,” Chief Financial Officer Fran Shammo said Oct. 17, concluding Verizon’s earnings call.
“We are excited about the future,” Shammo continued, “as we continue to invest, innovate and deliver for our customers, our shareholders and our employees.”