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By Bloomberg

Facebook Inc. is buying QuickFire Networks Corp., whose technology delivers video streams over the Internet, as the social network makes video delivery a top priority.

QuickFire announced the deal on its website today without disclosing terms. The San Diego-based startup will help Facebook show clips quickly without sacrificing as much of the quality, which will benefit Facebook as it boosts video delivery and expands the feature to emerging markets, where connections are slow.

The amount of video on Facebook’s news feed more than tripled last year, and the company is planning to tweak the website’s design so marketers can more easily buy video ads and monitor their campaigns. The efforts are central to the Menlo Park, California-based company’s efforts to tap the U.S. online- video advertising market, which EMarketer Inc. estimates will reach $7.8 billion this year, up 30 percent from $6 billion in 2014.

One of Facebook’s main challenges in adding video to the news feed is whether it will degrade the user experience by making users wait for videos to load. The company already modifies clips so they can be played more easily, and video advertisements in news feeds start automatically as users scroll past, without sound. Facebook has more than 1 billion daily video views.

“Video is an essential part of the Facebook experience. We are excited to bring QuickFire Networks on board as we continue delivering a high-quality video experience to the over 1.3 billion people who use Facebook,” Vanessa Chan, a spokeswoman for Facebook, wrote in an e-mailed statement.

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Some of QuickFire’s employees will join Facebook, and the company will wind down operations as it becomes part of the larger company, Craig Lee, QuickFire’s chief executive officer, said in a statement.

“Our goal has always been to provide a premium-quality, immediate, bandwidth-friendly video experience to consumers,” Lee said. “We’re thrilled to help deliver high-quality video experiences to all the people who consume video on Facebook.”