UltraViolet, the technology that bridges a single piece of content to a variety of devices, is unlikely to launch in the UK until the end of 2012, according to Michael Comish, CEO of Internet video streaming service blinkbox.

The first US movie title to be released physically with Ultra Violet digital ownership rights – Horrible Bosses – went on retail sale October 11 in the US. The UK has been identified as the second market for UltraViolet after the US, with Canada next.

blinkbox is 80 per cent-owned by supermarket group Tesco, a member of the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE), an open, cross-industry consortium of more than 70 companies dedicated to facilitating the development and operation of the UltraViolet ecosystem.

“Tesco is the second largest DVD retailer in the UK and the third largest Consumer Electronics retailer,” Comish told delegates at the Future of Digital Media Distribution conference in London. He accepted that the video content industry hadn’t made digital product “exciting enough” in the past, and suggested that UltraViolet should help stem the decline of [physical] retail. “It will decline, but not to the extent that music has.”

“Realistically, you’re looking at the back half of next year to see UltraViolet in the UK,” he admitted. “To say it will be earlier is wrong.”

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