Thursday, June 12, 2008

Interview with Alex Castro, Delve Networks

Seattle-based Delve Networks (www.delvenetworks.com), formerly Pluggd, announced its name change and a shift from podcast tools to software for publishing videos online yesterday, so we thought it would be interesting to talk with Alex Castro, the firm's CEO, about the reasons behind the change in direction, his opinion on the podcast market, and what the firm is now focused on.

So tell us a bit about the idea behind the name change and products?

Alex Castro: It's the same technology, the same ability to within audio and video, but in starting out to create a consumer destination we realized that there is a lot of interest from media companies and content publishers who were looking for their own branded video experience on their site. So we shifted our focus about 10 months ago, and since then have been working on the product for the last ten months. It all culminated in a rebranding from Pluggd to Delve Networks. That sort of matches our customers, it's more of a B-to-B, content owner, media company, video blogger customer. And also, we also felt the name helps people understand how we're different, which is we're able to look within the video. Which is delving into video, so they can have more insight, and really differentiate ourselves as a more intelligent video platform, because of our ability to look into the video.

What would a typical customer look like now?

Alex Castro: Our current beta customers run the gamut from a small creative video show in the Northwest called Small Screen Networks. They create a video show around mixing drinks. We also have folks like CNET, which has been beta testing the product, Intel, which has been beta testing, Wallstrip, which was just purchased by CBS Interactive, we have bikini.com, another mid-tier video show. It runs the gamut from guy with camera doing a mixed drinks to some of the biggest companies in technology and media.

Tell us, who are the current investors in the company, and are they the same backers now?

Alex Castro: Our investors invested in us on this plan last summer. Our investors are DFJ Frontier, Intel Capital, and Labrador Ventures.

What's your view why the podcasting business hasn't really taken off?

Alex Castro: It's sort of the difference between radio and television. I think podcasting is a lot bigger than people recognize, but Apple has really sucked the air out of that market. In some ways, they've really limited the ability of that market to get bigger. And, video is just a much richer experience for consumers. People thought audio would get big for awhile, and video to get bigger later, but what happened was video just really blew past audio and overshadowed it. I think of podcasting as just a subset of what we're doing now. But really, we've shifted our focus to video because that's where there is dramatic audience growth and publisher adoption.

When do you think you'll be deploying out of beta with the product?

Alex Castro: We're actually deploying out of beta any day now. Some of our first beta customers will go live with our search inside player on our system in the next couple of days.

Thanks!