Google did some heavy-lifting this week by paying $1.65 billion for YouTube. But now the real work begins.

The Internet king needs to find new technologies to improve its video search and spur video advertising on its sites. Analysts say Google can develop or license technologies, or acquire companies that create them. A combination of all three is also possible—good news for companies, mostly startups, in the space.

Right now, users search for videos on Google and YouTube by typing in words that describe the videos they’re looking for. But many videos aren’t cataloged with a text description, so technologies that automatically decipher audio content and images in videos are the vital next step. “The challenge for Google is how do you index content when you don’t have a text description of it?” said Gartner analyst Van Baker.

Indeed, more sophisticated search technologies will allow users to find the exact video they’re looking for, rather than sifting through hundreds of search results, said Phil Leigh, senior analyst at Inside Digital Media, said. And advanced technologies will also help Google place the most relevant video ads alongside search results.

Mr. Leigh said finding speech-recognition technologies that decipher words and music in videos is likely Google’s first challenge. He noted that Google might license this type of technology from companies like PodZinger, a Cambridge, Massachusetts startup that develops speech-recognition technology that make tens of thousands of podcasts searchable by keywords.

Other startups like Blinkx, a developer of voice and picture-recognition technology, and Metacafe, which makes video “fingerprinting” technology, are also way ahead of Google and YouTube in the video search space.

PodZinger CEO Alex Laats said image-recognition technologies are the most tricky to develop because there are fewer ways words can be interpreted than images. “It’s a harder problem,” Mr. Laats said. Imagine a piece of fine art that is a nude. Then imagine a piece of porn that’s nude. What’s the difference? We can’t even define porn, so how is an image-recognition technology going to do it?”

Others question whether Google can be successful at developing and incorporating more sophisticated video search technologies. Although the company’s complicated algorithms have allowed it to dominate traditional online text-based searches, it hasn’t had nearly as much success with other web services. Orkut, Google’s homegrown social networking site, has only been popular in Brazil. Gmail has cachet, but isn’t as popular as Yahoo’s service.

Contact the writer:WTanaka@RedHerring.com

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