Verizon to launch digital media service in July

Verizon announced a digital media utility service designed to help advertising, media and entertainment companies automate delivery of on-demand content to consumers on their TVs, smartphones and tablets.

The service, under development at Verizon for nearly three years, is currently in a second beta with nine charter content-creation companies and will be available for commercial release sometime in July, said David Rips, president of the division overseeing the project, called Verizon Digital Media Services. Digital content will be taken from content creators and delivered using Verizon's global IP network and two new secure data centers in southern California and northern Virginia, Rips said. "We are going to be the world's first fully automated, end-to-end digital media utility that generates enormous economies of scale and true unicast [media] streams to any device, on any platform, at any time that consumers want it, on demand," Rips said. One benefit to content creators is that they won't need to customize content to fit specific devices that range in physical size and run different operating systems, Rips said. About 200 Verizon developers have worked on the project, in addition to hundreds of other Verizon staff.