Yahoo announced in an official blog post that it has completed the acquisition of online video streaming company RayV.
The post, written by Yahoo VP of Cloud Platforms and Services P.P.S. Narayan, welcomes the RayV team to Yahoo, with most of the startup's employees joining the Yahoo R&D Center in Tel Aviv, Israel.
"This deal demonstrates our dedication to accelerating our video strategy and boosting our underlying technology infrastructure in the space," wrote Narayan.
Narayan also wrote that Yahoo is very focused this year on increasing the number of video users and monthly streams on their video services, named Yahoo Screen.
RayV, founded in 2006, created a cloud-based platform for the encoding, delivery and monetization of Web and mobile video. The company has superior signal strengths compared to that of YouTube, which would bring great improvements to the performance of Screen.
Yahoo's purchase of RayV comes as the company aggressively moves into the online media industry. Yahoo has just recently announced that it will revive ex-NBC sitcom Community for its sixth season, which will be exclusively shown online. In April, Yahoo revealed that it will be creating two 30-minute original series, with one led by film director Paul Feig.
Yahoo also forged a partnership last April with LiveNation, in a deal that will see Yahoo stream a concert daily. The launch for the new music channel will be on July 15, which will feature performances by John Legend and the Dave Matthews Band.
In addition to content offerings, Yahoo has also added several celebrities in its roster, including journalist Katie Couric, who will be tasked as Yahoo's global anchor to conduct interviews with esteemed guests.
Yahoo is looking to compete in an industry that includes Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, and even Microsoft with the company's Xbox Originals studio.
Yahoo's creation of content will be made more meaningful if users find the content to be very accessible, which is where RayV would contribute to Yahoo's plans.
"The RayV team shares our passion for innovation and commitment to build a video infrastructure to deliver the ultimate video experience to our users," Narayan wrote.
Reports in May revealed that Yahoo was nearing the acquisition of RayV. Terms of the completed deal, however, were not disclosed.
Last year, Yahoo failed in purchasing Dailymotion and Hulu. This year, after the successful acquisition of RayV, the company is also looking to bolster Yahoo Screen with proposed acquisition of other online video service companies.
