On a mission to beat YouTube and Facebook in one important way

When it comes to competitors, one Singapore startup has picked a serious fight: it’s up against YouTube and Facebook.

Uiza wants companies to use its video system instead of uploading them to either YouTube or Facebook, explains co-founder Gareth Nguyen.

While YouTube and Facebook might be free, companies can end up “relying too much on the platforms” for their video content, Nguyen tells Tech in Asia.

Kevin Nguyen and Gareth Nguyen / Photo credit: Uiza

“They have absolutely no control over the video themselves. They can’t control the privacy of the content, the data that’s generated from them,” he adds, referring to the limited video metrics the social networks provide.

Say no to the Zuck buck

What he and business partner Kevin Nguyen (no relation) have built is a service that allows firms and brands of any size to store and stream video content on their own websites or apps.

It’s especially useful for companies that prefer to keep their video content restricted to paying customers and don’t want Silicon Valley’s tech giants littering their vids with ads – for example, an online school that has tons of video lessons. One such business is Topica, an education site that has grown to 1,300 employees since launching in 2008. The Vietnamese startup is one of Uiza’s major clients.

The paid service allows firms to do what they can’t do with Facebook or Google video embeds, such as stuff online chat into the video system. It also allows the video player to be branded, giving a more professional and consistent look to a firm’s app or website.

Facebook’s founder and CEO / Photo credit: Mark Zuckerberg

Most of Uiza’s clients previously used Facebook and/or YouTube for their video-streaming needs, says Kevin. Its corporate customers are spread across four video-hungry sectors: online education, social media, ecommerce, and digital media. Ecommerce clients make good use of the in-video chat tool as livestreaming increasingly plays a part in online shopping.

Uiza’s corporate users are mainly in Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and Thailand. But the actual video streamers – which Gareth, the startup’s chief of growth, describes as “the customers of our customers” – are scattered across the globe.

The startup uses machine learning to make sure videos stream quickly around the world from the major hosting services it uses, such as Amazon Web Services. What Gareth calls its “streaming infrastructure” so far covers 44 countries, with plans to grow that to 80 by the end of the year.

Its biggest-name business partner is arguably messaging app Line, which uses Uiza’s system to stream videos created on its women-focused portal Webtretho.

A win-win situation

Looking back to go forward