Microsoft joins forces with other tech giants to create next-generation video format

Microsoft has joined forces with six other industry giants, including Google, Amazon, and Mozilla, to form the Alliance for Open Media. The alliance's main goal is to work together to create new open source formats and codecs for online video, audio, and other streaming media.

In all, the Alliance for Open Media is made up of Amazon, Cisco, Google, Intel, Microsoft, Mozilla, and Netflix. Each member will contribute its expertise to an initial project in an effort to create an open, royalty-free "next-generation" video format that adheres to the following:

  • Interoperable and open;
  • Optimized for the web;
  • Scalable to any modern device at any bandwidth;
  • Designed with a low computational footprint and optimized for hardware;
  • Capable of consistent, highest-quality, real-time video delivery; and
  • Flexible for both commercial and non-commercial content, including user-generated content.

It will definitely be interesting to see if the combined might of these tech giants can succeed in creating widely adopted codecs for online media consumption. While the initial list of founding members already includes some of the biggest names in tech, we could see other tech titans join in the future.

Source: Alliance for Open Media; Via: The Next Web

Dan Thorp-Lancaster

Dan Thorp-Lancaster is the former Editor-in-Chief of Windows Central. He began working with Windows Central, Android Central, and iMore as a news writer in 2014 and is obsessed with tech of all sorts. You can follow Dan on Twitter @DthorpL and Instagram @heyitsdtl