Rakuten Viki is an American over-the-top subscription video on-demand

streaming Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a network for playback using a media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of packets from a server to a client and is rendered in real-time; this contrasts with file downl ...

service. It streams videos similar to other services, but also allows users to subtitle content available in 200 languages as well as providing original programming. Headquartered in

San Mateo, California San Mateo ( ) is the most populous city in San Mateo County, California, United States, on the San Francisco Peninsula. It is part of the San Francisco Bay Area metropolitan region, and is located about south of San Francisco. San Mateo border ...

, it has offices in

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

Tokyo, Japan Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

, and

Seoul, South Korea Seoul, officially Seoul Special Metropolitan City, is the capital city, capital and largest city of South Korea. The broader Seoul Metropolitan Area, encompassing Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, emerged as the world's List of cities b ...

. The name Viki is a

portmanteau In linguistics, a blend—also known as a blend word, lexical blend, or portmanteau—is a word formed by combining the meanings, and parts of the sounds, of two or more words together.

of the words video and

wiki A wiki ( ) is a form of hypertext publication on the internet which is collaboratively edited and managed by its audience directly through a web browser. A typical wiki contains multiple pages that can either be edited by the public or l ...

, drawing on the latter's use of volunteers for

content management Content management (CM) are a set of processes and technologies that support the collection, managing, and publishing of information in any form or medium. When stored and accessed via computers, this information may be more specifically referre ...

. The company won the Crunchie award for best international start-up company in January 2011.

History

2007–2012; Early history

Viki was founded in 2007 by Razmig Hovaghimian, Changseong Ho and Jiwon Moon. Funding for the company originally came from Neoteny Labs, a Singapore-based

start-up A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship includes all new businesses including self-employment and businesses that do not intend ...

fund headed by Joichi Ito, and from the co-founder of

LinkedIn LinkedIn () is an American business and employment-oriented Social networking service, social network. It was launched on May 5, 2003 by Reid Hoffman and Eric Ly. Since December 2016, LinkedIn has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft. ...

Reid Hoffman Reid Garrett Hoffman (born August 5, 1967) is an American internet entrepreneur, venture capitalist, podcaster, and author. Hoffman is the co-founder and former executive chairman of LinkedIn, a business-oriented social network used primarily ...

. The company moved to Singapore in 2008 to take advantage of government backing and the

city-state A city-state is an independent sovereign city which serves as the center of political, economic, and cultural life over its contiguous territory. They have existed in many parts of the world throughout history, including cities such as Rome, ...

's role as a pan-Asian hub. In December 2010, Viki exited the beta phase of its

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

and made its services available to the general public. It was purchased by Rakuten in 2013. In September 2011, Viki debuted a new

iPhone The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at ...

app called Viki On-The-Go, allowing users to watch content on their

smartphone A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as multi ...

s. The company also partnered with

Samsung Samsung Group (; stylised as SΛMSUNG) is a South Korean Multinational corporation, multinational manufacturing Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in the Samsung Town office complex in Seoul. The group consists of numerous a ...

Southeast Asia that year to develop an Android app. Viki.com drew 14 million unique views in August 2011. Viki raised $20 million from Greylock Partners, Andreessen Horowitz, and

BBC Worldwide BBC Worldwide Ltd. was the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in January 1995. The company monetised BBC brands, selling BBC and other British programming for broadcas ...

in October of that year. In May 2012, Viki announced deals with

Warner Music Group Warner Music Group Corp., commonly abbreviated as WMG, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational entertainment and record label Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It is one of the "Record label#M ...

, SEED Music Group of

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

, and LOEN Entertainment of South Korea, bringing thousands of music videos to the site. In that same month, BBC Worldwide announced an extension of its relationship with Viki, including a deal to work with the company on

advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a Product (business), product or Service (economics), service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of int ...

. In July 2012, Viki signed a non-exclusive deal with the Chinese social network Renren, in which Viki would provide a video site for the social network called VikiZone. The deal includes only a portion of the Viki catalog and is offered for free.

2013–present; Purchase by Rakuten

In the year following its acquisition by Rakuten, Viki went from about 22 million

monthly active users Active users is a software performance metric that is commonly used to measure the level of engagement for a particular software product or object, by quantifying the number of active interactions from users or visitors within a relevant range ...

with 10 million on mobile to 35 million monthly active users and 25 million mobile users. The company has a list of partners for sourcing original content, including BBC Worldwide. The company has also signed distribution deals for its original content with Hulu, Netflix, Yahoo!, MSN, NBC, and A&E, as well as

TVB Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB; zh, t=電視廣播有限公司) is a television broadcasting company based in Hong Kong. The company operates five free-to-air terrestrial television channels in Hong Kong, with TVB Jade as its main Canton ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

, SBS in South Korea,

Fuji TV JOCX-DTV (channel 8), branded as or , is a Japanese television station that serves the Kantō region as the flagship (broadcasting), flagship station of the Fuji News Network (FNN) and the Fuji Network System (FNS). The station is owned-and- ...

in Japan and Amedia in Russia.

Services

Viki streams premium licensed content in a similar way that

Hulu Hulu (, ) is an American Subscription business model, subscription streaming media service owned by Disney Streaming, a subsidiary of the Disney Entertainment segment of the Walt Disney Company. It was launched on October 29, 2007, initially as ...

does in

U.S. The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguous ...

markets. The site then puts the content on one of its channels, and the content can be subtitled by community volunteers. Community members can subtitle their favorite videos in their preferred languages, under a

Creative Commons license A Creative Commons (CC) license is one of several public copyright licenses that enable the free distribution of an otherwise copyrighted "work". A CC license is used when an author wants to give other people the right to share, use, and bu ...

using Viki's subtitling technology, enabling individuals to collaborate globally, in dozens of languages at once. The subtitling software developed for the company allows many volunteers to translate a video concurrently in up to 160 languages. Viki also

syndicates A syndicate is a self-organizing group of individuals, companies, corporations or entities formed to transact some specific business, to pursue or promote a shared interest. Etymology The word ''syndicate'' comes from the French language, Fren ...

its shows with fan-generated subtitles to partners such as Hulu,

Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...

, and

Yahoo! Yahoo (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web portal that provides the search engine Yahoo Search and related services including My Yahoo, Yahoo Mail, Yahoo News, Yahoo Finance, Yahoo Sports, y!entertainment, yahoo!life, and its a ...

, and receives fees and

revenue In accounting, revenue is the total amount of income generated by the sale of product (business), goods and services related to the primary operations of a business. Commercial revenue may also be referred to as sales or as turnover. Some compan ...

from those distributors. Of the approximately 200 language subtitles available on the site, roughly 50 of these are vulnerable or endangered languages.

Original programming

Viki has more than 100 original programs, including entertainment shows, drama and mini-series. * '' Dramaworld'' (2016) * '' Where Your Eyes Linger'' (2020) * '' Light on Me'' (2021)

References

External

*
Coolest Offices in Singapore - Viki Office Tour
{{Rakuten 2013 mergers and acquisitions 500 Startups companies Advertising video on demand American companies established in 2007 Android (operating system) software Companies based in San Mateo, California Internet television streaming services IOS software Rakuten TvOS software