? Free ad-supported platforms face quality, reliability and control issues when live streaming

? Technology continues to democratize the creation, distribution and monetization of video content

? Cancellation of its subscription video-on-demand service allows Vimeo to support content creators' over-the-top plans

As the hyper-competitive TV and video industry evolves toward a direct-to-consumer world, the formula for success continues to shift rapidly. S&P Global Market Intelligence spoke with Anjali Sud, CEO of IAC/InterActiveCorp's ad-free, open video platform Vimeo, about the company's over-the-top ambitions and its plan to further differentiate itself from Facebook Inc. and Alphabet Inc.'s YouTube through a brand new premium live streaming service.

S&P Global Market Intelligence: What is the strategy behind the premium live-streaming service that Vimeo recently announced?

Anjali Sud: In the past year, live streaming has emerged as the number one feature requested by professional filmmakers, business and organizations that use Vimeo. When we dug into why our creators were asking for live streaming, we found that while live streaming is available on free, ad-supported platforms such as Facebook or YouTube, there is some frustration with the quality, reliability and control that these platforms offer. On the other hand, you have enterprise-level offerings with live streaming support, but if you are not a large studio or sports network, you likely cannot afford those options. So what Vimeo is trying to do is provide the highest level of quality for smaller businesses and organizations, as well as individual, professional users. As a result, Vimeo creators will soon be a click away from broadcasting their own live events, as well archiving and owning the content on Vimeo, which they can distribute anywhere.

Who poses the most competition for Vimeo in the premium live streaming space? And will the live feature help Vimeo further differentiate itself from YouTube and other free, ad-supported platforms?

There are not many large competitors. Most players offering live streaming are either free, ad-supported models like YouTube, or are largely on the enterprise side such as Brightcove. But the main way we have differentiated ourselves is by being an ad-free platform, as well as through the quality and professionalism of our tools. We have spent a lot of time in the past year launching professional-level features.

Vimeo is also powering two Lionsgate Entertainment over-the-top channels: Kevin Hart's Laugh Out Loud comedy site and the Tribeca Shortlist movie platform. Is this the sort of thing you plan to pursue more of in future?

We absolutely believe that there will be more and more content creators – both large and small – that are going direct-to-consumer with their own subscriptions services and we are very interested on powering the technology behind that. You will see more examples like our business partnership with Lionsgate in the future. However, it is not just the large studios and big media publishers following this path anymore. We're seeing a lot of individual creators being able to go OTT. Some of our most successful channels using our technology are in genres such as fitness, education or other areas where you don't have to be a Lionsgate. As technology continues to democratize the creation, distribution and monetization of video, there will be some expansion and this ecosystem will continue to flourish. That's the opportunity that we're excited about serving.

Are we fast approaching a saturated OTT market whereby consumers are overwhelmed by choice? Do we need to aggregate these platforms in some way and how is Vimeo planning for that?

The natural ebbs and flows of the media world is that you tend to have deconsolidation followed by a period of aggregation. There will be a proliferation of choice and then at some point, viewers will need ways to cope with that. But at the same time, more options for monetizing content is good for creators. The role that we hope to play on the aggregation side comes down to curation, where we go above and behind the tech algorithms to invest in real, human curation. In a world where you're going to have so many options, having those human lens becomes more important over time.

Vimeo recently canceled plans to launch an SVOD service. Is this something you will consider revisiting in the future?

We do not have any plans to launch an SVOD service or to invest in original content in the future. The reason that we are not doing that is we want to double down and focus on providing a community and tools for creators. When we first set out to do an SVOD service a couple of years ago, we were not seeing the level of investment in original content that we see today from such large players. When Vimeo looks at the market now, we don't think there is a need for another platform like ours to be spending millions, or even billions, of dollars on original content because there are a lot of players already doing that. What we don't see others focusing on is the provision of an independent home for creators so they can monetize on any platform. As other platforms such as Facebook or YouTube battle for eyeballs and advertising dollars, we want to be the home for creators to not only create wonderful stories, but also to distribute and monetize them anywhere.

Going forward, are there any geographic markets you will focus on for international expansion?

We are a global platform so everything that we launch is always undertaken with a global view. Live streaming will be available through Vimeo to everyone. But I will say that in general when we think about growth at Vimeo for the future, we are very focused on bringing the same level of community that we have in the U.S. to other countries across the globe. Today, more than 50% of Vimeo uploaders, creators, viewers and users are outside the U.S. and that percentage is growing quickly and is increasingly spread out across all regions. Europe is obviously a large market for us but so are Asia and Latin America.