Online video giant Machinima expands to UK

One of the most popular YouTube channels for games content is setting up a dedicated UK business.

US firm Machinima has told MCV it plans to target British gamers as part of a European expansion that will deliver new and localised video content.

It has already promoted former UK community chief Ken Burton to head of Machinima UK as it looks to grow its programming slate.

Machinima has become a major player in online video, running YouTube channels full of both original content, such as magazine shows about games, plus content from indie video producers.

It both helps new ‘directors’ create their own show and also co-produces big budget projects like Halo: Forward Unto Dawn with Xbox.

The channel boasts 210m unique viewers per month, and over 2.25bn video views. Its monthly audience in

the UK alone is over 200m video views.

But the business has been predominantly run from the US. European expansion means it can deliver a mix of existing programs and new UK-made ones to British gamers and grow that figure.

I’m very excited about our European expansion and launches of these channels,” president Philip DeBevoise.

We aren’t going to be limited to UK, France and Germany – there are some fast-growing territories we can get into with our shows, plus local content and support from partners. And we’re keen to explore models that have worked for both traditional and new media.”

He added that a consistent interest amongst the firm’s switched-on audience will mean it’s easy to push out further around the globe.

There is a homogeneous nature to some parts of our audience where similar people get excited by games, movies, comic books and tech. It sort of crosses borders. So we see similarities at Brasil Game Show, Gamescom, PAX or an event like EG Expo in London.

So we have an incredible opportunity to speak to them with formats that can be transported, localised, with new formats, or entirely new content.”