Innovation & Job News

Ann Arbor's Magic Coast switches to video streaming technology, hopes to weather economy

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

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Ann Arbor

Magic Coast got its start nearly seven years ago, creating software for automotive suppliers. Today the Ann Arbor-based company provides internal video streaming for corporations. Why the change? The company saw how profitable the new technology was while working on a project for one of the Big 3 and, appropriately, shifted gears.

"We saw that corporations were using video streaming more and more so we decided to capitalize on it," says Bill Dunning, CEO of Magic Coast. "That really took hold (switching from software development to video streaming) over the last 12 months. All last summer we were ramping up on it."

The switch hasn't been without some growing pains. The company started with a couple of people and grew to about eight recently before downsizing to three and a handful of independent contractors.

Magic Coast was bringing in more and more customers ranging from automotive based firms to radio stations, such as WRIF. The downfall of the economy put a hold on a lot of the expansion, so much so that Dunning is hoping for the best when it comes to growth but preparing for the worst.

"We are prepping for a flat year and hoping for better," Dunning says. "It's hard to really do anything. When we show our system to people, they really like it, but they're putting off all capital projects until the next quarter."

Source: Bill Dunning, CEO of Magic Coast
Writer: Jon Zemke

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