ITN signs new deals with search engines

by Media Week, Media Week 14-Feb-06

ITN Multimedia, content provider for mobile and broadband platforms, has secured deals with Google, MSN and IPTV platform Blinkx.

The supplier of news and entertainment video services is announcing the
deals at this week's 3GSM mobile communications conference in Barcelona.
The deals are part of the news provider's push to address changes in the

way consumers watch and pick up news.

Nicholas Wheeler, managing director of ITN Multimedia, said these
partnerships are part of the recognition that people will increasingly
pick and choose which news they are interested in "rather than consume
news in a linear fashion".

The ITN division has partnered with Google to provide content for the
search engine's Video Store. Most of the content provided to Google will
be archive footage.

For MSN, ITN will provide news and entertainment content for its new
video channel, MSN Video, now going through its test period.

ITN has also agreed to provide news and entertainment content for video
search engine blinkx.tv. ITN manages the collections of British Pathe,
Reuters, Granada, Channel 4, Fox News and Fox Movietone.

Wheeler added: "Operators need to recognise the vital part that serious
information now plays in developing content for the mobile market - and
to see that, as a platform, it must be much more than the 3G of girls,
games and gambling."