Dive Brief: 

• According to sources close to the deal, Twitter is speeding up its plans to release autoplay video ads -- an idea the social platform has been toying with since last year. 
• Twitter has been testing two versions of autoplay videos -- one that automatically plays a 6-second loop of the ad as a preview and another that automatically plays the entirety of the video ad. 
• The autoplay video ads -- expected to launch by the end of June -- will be supported by the recent deal Twitter struck to utilize Google data in ad targeting. 

Dive Insight: 

If Twitter really wants to compete with Facebook for ad dollars, it has to launch autoplay videos. Facebook just announced it has hit 4 billion daily video views -- up from 1 billion just in September -- that can be mostly attributed to the autoplay feature. Marketers are asking for autoplay, so its time for Twitter to deliver.