Google Cloud has a multi-year partnership with Avid as the two companies aim to add generative and agentic AI tools to the video editing process.
The partnership was announced ahead of the start of the NAB Show in Las Vegas on Saturday, where both companies will have a significant presence.
As part of the deal, Google’s Gemini model and Vertex AI will be integrated directly into Avid’s setup, which the companies say will significantly reduce the time needed to discover and produce media. Avid adds Google AI to Media Composer, a nonlinear editing system for professional film and television. Content Core is a new cloud-native Software-as-a-Service platform.
Google Cloud said in a blog post that recent customers include Gray Media, the owner of a major local TV station. Major League Baseball. and NBCUniversal.
Along with the new show, the blog post says, “Media organizations store decades of archived footage that is difficult to search and expensive to manage. AI can automatically tag every scene and shot, making large video libraries as searchable as the web. This enables teams to find and reuse content in seconds, opening new ways to monetize their archives through hyperlocal streaming and more relevant viewer experiences.”
France’s Canal+ is one of the latest media players to incorporate Google’s AI tools to help organize its archives.
Buzz Hayes, a film producer and former Lucasfilm executive who is now global market lead for entertainment at Google Cloud, said in an interview with Deadline that the potential for mining libraries is enormous. For example, with significant investment in original microdramas, IP holders can repackage their library series by leveraging technology brought to market by Google Cloud and Avid.
“A 30-minute, 22-minute comedy series has seven acts, because act one was supposed to be the commercial break,” Hayes pointed out. “That means we already have the ability to take a series and turn it into the micro-series we want.…This is a very interesting possibility, especially given that the cost of producing content has become so high.”
Avid CEO Welford Dillard said his company’s customers “want intelligent tools that plug into their existing workflows and grow with their creativity.” The partnership with Google Cloud helps meet that need, “strengthening our ability to deliver secure AI-driven innovation while preserving Avid’s interoperability and adaptability across a broader range of production environments,” Dillard added.
Anil Jain, global managing director of strategic industries at Google Cloud, said the collaboration shows the industry is “moving beyond simple automation.” Editors who access Avid tools that incorporate AI will be able to “work with intelligent agents to create assets on the fly and handle the heavy lifting like matching styles and embedding timelines, allowing them to focus on storytelling instead of infrastructure.”
