Cricket Communications Inc. has chosen mobile TV and video provider QuickPlay Media's OpenVideo media management platform to power its new mobile video service.

Cricket's video service includes a wide variety of content including music videos, sports, comedy, entertainment, animation and specific items targeted to Hispanic audiences. The new video download offers customers unlimited video viewing as a $5-a-month add-on to Cricket's monthly rate plans.

"Cricket was looking for a high-quality, fast-to-market video service that would appeal to their diverse customer base," said Tina Kaichis, director of marketing communications and channel marketing for QuickPlay Media, Toronto.

"As this was their first mobile video offering, they needed a company that could offer a complete solution that had been proven in the market and that had features that would help them to quickly stimulate adoption and usage," she said.

Cricket, a subsidiary of Leap Wireless International Inc., said it chose QuickPlay because of its advanced personalization capabilities and selection of mobile video content targeted to Cricket's diverse customer base.

The Cricket video download service features enhanced discovery, with five top-level categories letting customers more easily sift through the large content library, in addition to searching by content name or description.

Personalized offerings include "Top Videos," as determined by the total number of downloads; "What's Hot," as selected by Cricket; and "We Recommend," which are based on either previous downloads or current selections.

Adoption stimulation features include universal content browsing, which lets all Cricket customers browse the portal and view video categories and clip listings.

The preview feature lets non-subscribers with video-enabled devices trial the service and then prompts each to become a subscriber.

Together, these two features let customers test-drive the Cricket service and experience mobile video firsthand before making a more firm commitment.

The Cricket offering does not currently include advertising, although QuickPlay does offer a mobile advertising platform.

Features of this service include dynamic stitching of contextual and demographic- and location-aware ads that support placement options such as pre-roll, post-roll or in-stream with full tracking and reporting of consumption behavior.

Cricket will handle all the marketing for the mobile video service.

"We support our customers in developing and refining their marketing programs by sharing marketing program best practices and by conducting in-market studies to better understand consumption behaviors and then share this information with our customers," Ms. Kaichis said.

QuickPlay's OpenVideo platform powers mobile video services for 14 major carriers in North America and Europe, providing both live and on-demand content from more than 150 different media companies.

Key features of the QuickPlay media management platform include a content management and distribution system, reporting and analytics to manage mediation and settlement and open APIs to facilitate partner integration.

"Cricket has a very unique and highly diverse customer base," Ms. Kaichis said. "QuickPlay, through existing content relationships, was able to meet their needs for relevant, cost-effective content that would appeal to their customers.

"The trial feature is important, as it allows Cricket customers to experience the service before they make a full commitment," she said. "As with all new services, stimulating usage is a critical success factor and the solution supports a number of features that facilitate this."