While Thomson Reuters is spending $1 billion developing Project Utah, a new common desktop platform for all its customers, the group does not want to intrude on existing business broadcasters' territory, its head of multimedia has told Journalism.co.uk.

Although Reuters 'wants to be the one-stop shop' for its clients, it does not wish to encroach on the territory of Bloomberg, Fox News or CNBC, Cramer added, at the Association of Online Publishers (AOP) 2009 conference.

The project, first publicised earlier this year and to be launched in 2010, is designed to be 'global, simplified, scalable' to its customers' specific needs.

"I think it's one of the most significant developments when it comes to multimedia around at the moment. We listen to our clients - they're screaming at us [for this type of service] and they have been for years," said Cramer, who said that he was 'flushed out of early retirement' to take up his current position at Reuters.

Reuters' financial clients wanted a vertical offering them content and information relevant to their business interests and to allow them 'to go look at that, and only that', he said.

An important part of Utah is Project Insider, currently in beta for around 6,000 to 8,000 clients, is a web-based television service.

Listen to Chris Cramer talk to Journalism.co.uk below:



More to follow from the summit throughout the day: in the meantime, follow this tweetstream featuring choice 140-character updates by digital journalists and publishers at the event.

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