BitTorrent said it has tapped Jeremy Johnson and Robert Delamar as co-CEOs as the company looks to accelerate its focus on on-demand and live streaming platforms and services. 

The company confirmed that former CEO Eric Klinker is staying with BitTorrent “in a technical role.”

BitTorrent said it made the change up top as it looks to further commercialize and accelerate the reach of its distribution platform for creators and other partners. It now claims that 200 million fans use its BitTorrent Bundle system for on demand music and video.

BitTorrent has plans for a spring launch of its first applicaton for live video streaming based on the company’s “Live” protocol.  BitTorrent has already been expanding its video strategy via its BitTorrent Bundle, which sells shows from programming partners, and an  expansion into original content.

In his new role, Johnson will head up technology and the go-to-market strategy and executive management of BitTorrent’s product development, operations and media teams. He’s late of Silver Spring, Sony Online Entertainment, NetVmg, and Excite@Home.

Delamar, a digital content distribution platform specialist, is a co-founder of several digital content services, including urbmob, Totalmovie, and UUX, a hybrid live/linear and VOD platform.

BitTorrent also announced David Chidekel as head of business development and business affairs, responsible for content acquisition and sponsorship deals; Straith Schreder as VP of creative initiatives. Schreder, who joined BitTorrent in 2012, will head up creator-focused initiatives, which include the opening of an office in Los Angeles. 

BitTorrent said its “Live” team has hired Monica Piriz as vice president of programming and acquisition.

Piriz joins BitTorrent Live after serving as VP of content acquisition and strategy at Piksel, an over-the-top/multiscreen video specialist.

BitTorrent also announced that it is demonstrating a coming, “mobile-focused, multi-channel OTT live streaming” based on its proprietary BitTorrent Live protocol at this week’s TV of Tomorrow Show in New York. The company claims that the platform can deliver live video at scale at low latencies without pre-provisioning and sans the need for a traditional content delivery network.

BitTorrent said it’s being testing the technology with a number of unnamed “broadcast partners.” BitTorrnt VP Erik Schwartz leads the company’s Live team.

Of late, BitTorrent has been upping its video game with its BitTorrent Bundle platform to sell shows from programming partners and to underpin its expansion into original content.

BBC Worldwide will use the BitTorrent Bundle platform to sell “selected highlights” from the last ten years of Doctor Who for $12.

The bundle will feature 10 episodes from the 2005-2014 portion of the show’s run, as well as a five-episode “An Introduction to New Who” (with introductions from Peter Capaldi, the actor currently playing the role of the Doctor), and two additional features – Earth Conquest (a TV movie from 2014), and the original script (in PDF) of Rose, the opening episode of the first series of the revived version of the series. The bundle also offers two free streams/downloads --The Decade of Doctor Who, and a preview of the Rose episode.

BitTorrent Bundle is a global platform that uses the company's file-sharing technology to enable content owners to upload their content and offer it as they see fit – for free or for a price.

“This innovative deal with BitTorrent allows us to directly reach a huge number of consumers and engage with fans on a global and fast-growing digital platform,” Julia Kenyon, director of Drama Brands for BBC Worldwide, said in a statement. “Music content has seen tremendous success through BitTorrent Bundle, and this deal is the first of its kind for British TV content.”

“This is an exciting way for fans to celebrate ten years of New Who, and we are honored to welcome the good Doctor to BitTorrent Bundle,” added Matt Mason, BitTorrent’s chief content officer.

Among recent activity, Mance Media has begun to offer trailers and full-length movies in 4K via BitTorrent Bundle.  BitTorrent will also use the platform to underpin its  expansion into original content.

Mance Media, an independent distributor of films and TV shows, said it will sell a handful of films in 4K format via BitTorrent Bundle, a global platform that enables content owners to upload their content and offer it as they see fit.

Mance Media said it will offer trailers and full-length movies in partnership with BitTorrent. Consumers can obtain the 4K trailers for free, and pay between $5 to $6 to unlock the full-length title in 5.1 surround sound as well as a hi-res digital version of the movie’s official movie poster.

Mance Media, which is using HEVC compression for 4K, claims it can deliver a 90-minute movie in 4K and 5.1 in a 3 gigabyte file without sacrificing video quality. From a file-size standpoint, that’s a far cry from BitTorrrent’s initial 4K distribution of Superorganismfrom Mickey Hart, the former Grateful Dead drummer, which was delivered in 2013 as a largely uncompressed 286 Gigabyte torrent. 

The work with BitTorrent Bundle "is groundbreaking in terms of distribution,” Matthew Mancinelli, CEO of Mance Media, said.

Mance Media’s other announced 4K distribution partners include M-GO, Sony, Amazon, and Dish Network, which is will offer content in the new format via the 4K Ultra HD Joey, a device that's slated to become available this summer.

Titles from Mance Media that will be offered in 4K through BitTorrent Bundles include TheToy Soldiers, Dragons: Real Myths And Unreal Creatures, Scarlet’s Witch, and nature documentary Circles Of Life: Iceland In 4K.

“Today marks the first collection of 4K films to be distributed via BitTorrent,” Straith Schreder, director of brand marketing at BitTorrent, said in a statement. “We’re excited to work with Mance to share this ultra HD collection with our global network of fans.”

BitTorrent, which is expanding into original content, said in February that about 200 million users downloaded or streamed a Bundle over the last 18 months.