Jeremy Flynn, Vodafone's head of commercial partnerships and NOC Executive Committee member, is to leave the operator next month to launch a mobile video start-up.
D2see will focus on enabling content providers to launch mobile video. It's being launched to capitalise on mobile's move to rich media, a market that Flynn believes will be driven by music and video.
"If the mobile entertainment market has grown to its £650m value today on simple services like ringtones and chat, we'll see another 40% growth due to music and video," he said.
D2see will provide an end-to-end video and audio aggregation service for content owners, from editing to delivery to revenue collection. It plans initially to concentrate on video shortcode services, where consumers call a shortcode number to have video streamed to their phone.
"As the operators sort out their tariffs, then we'll move to IP-delivered video," said Flynn who has played a key part in developing Vodafone's third party D2C strategy.
"Providing 'Long Tail' specialist video and user generated content, subsidised by sponsorhip and advertising will drive the future market," he added.
According to research group Infonetics, the global market for mobile video services is set to reach $5.6 billion by 2009, from $46.2 million this year. That's a 11,997 percent increase. But the firm gave a long list of barriers that must be overcome before this growth can be realized. They include content quality issues, pricing, advanced handset capabilities and ease of use.
The whole argument of "convenience trumps limitations" is a questionable one at best. Users may check out mobile TV and video services out of curiosity, but they won't become repeat adopters until the wider industry gets its act together.
D2see is launching with six staff next month, including Will Neale from Accenture as co-founder, and plans to reach ten after Christmas.
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