LeWeb Paris (Video): Images Are Good Business, Says Shutterstock

Over a decade of its existence, US image marketplace Shutterstock has amassed a collection of 20 million images that it sells to media agencies, businesses and directly to consumers. Born from an investment of a few thousand dollars, it now competes with such long-established players as Getty Images and Corbis.

Our colleagues from Silicon France had a chance to chat with Jon Oringer, serial entrepreneur and CEO of Shutterstock, while he was visiting LeWeb 2012 in Paris last week.

Don’t tell me, show me

The platform created by Oringer is now used by 35,000 photographers, graphic designers and visual artists to sell their work. For some, Shutterstock is an easy way to earn pocket money, while for others it’s the primary source of income.

A different side of the platform is its search engine – with clever algorithms and tags to help customers find exactly what they are looking for.

In May, Shutterstock filed for a $115 million initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange. That’s quite an achievement for a company that was essentially created by one man, from scratch. Shutterstock already has a tight grip on the image market, and now it plans to diversify into video. Below, you can see Oringer talk about the challenges of the European market and the business model of the company.

LeWeb also hit London this year, and will be coming back in 2013, on June 5 and 6.

This video was first posted on Silicon France.

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