Brightcove Supports HTML5 for Apple iPad

Another phase of the iPad video saga has begun with Brightcove's announcement that HTML5 is now supported by their online video platform. This vastly simplifies video and advertisement publishing for Brightcove's 1,000-plus clients who are interested in entering the iPad arena. The company will continue to support Adobe Flash.

Brightcove chairman and CEO Jeremy Allaire stated, "Our customers want to be able to deliver their video content to every screen without sacrificing the quality, interactivity and monetization capabilities they have come to expect from the Brightcove platform. The Brightcove Experience for HTML5 fills the gap between the current playback capabilities of the emerging standard and what our customers need to operate successful online video businesses."

Throughout the year, more features will be added to Brightcove Experience for HTML5 until the product has full parity with its Adobe Flash counterpart. Currently, some features such as full support for branding of the player environment, social sharing, advertising, and analytics are lacking in Experience for HTML5. The product currently serves as a way to support the H.264 codec and create iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch compatible websites.

Features of Brightcove's iPad solution include:

- Automatic switching between HTML5 and Flash based on device detection
- Native HTML5 player templates
- H.264 video transcoding
- Available free for current subscribers to Brightcove Professional, Enterprise, and Express $499 editions

Brightcove clearly intends to remain above the fray when it comes to the battle of words between Adobe and Apple over a lack of Flash support on the iPad. The company now provides solutions for both technologies in its software.