AOL announces the next steps in its ambitious global expansion effort with the international launch of
AOL Video. The new offerings will let consumers find and watch millions of videos in
Canada,
India and
Taiwan without having to visit multiple websites. Additional plans are underway to launch video portals in the United Kingdom, France and Germany in the fall. The portal launches build on the success of the international launch of the Truveo video search engine, which recently unveiled sites in Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, The Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Taiwan, Turkey and United Kingdom.
The video sites will be strategically integrated into Canada, India and Taiwan’s AOL portal products. Each country site will be localized and will showcase a streamlined design to drive engagement and monetization. Standard and customized local advertising packages will be available. The Truveo platform will be leveraged to dynamically program the portal as well as power video search.
By combining industry-leading technology with a unique, easy-to-use user experience, the AOL Video portal has become one of the fastest growing sites on the Internet. Over the past 12 months, skyrocketing consumer demand for online video has propelled the number of unique visitors on AOL Video to grow to 17 million per month. In the same period, page views have grown to 96 million.
As part of its international growth plans, AOL now has a presence in 21 countries and plans to expand to 30 countries by the end of 2008. Offerings in most of these countries include AOL portals as well as AOL/HP co-branded portals and services.