You have to hand it to Ridley Scott and Fox – this is how you do a promo video.

A fictional TED talk acts as a perfect introduction for a very important character in the Alienverse, that of Peter Weyland, played here by Guy Pearce. Apparently an Englishman with a plan for the future and in this promo video he likens his new technology to that of Prometheus – explaining in a stroke where the title originates.

It’s a great video and handsomely produced – I’m guessing we may see some or all of this in the film. It appears to have been directed by Ridley Scott’s son Luke, so it’s more likely to be an accompanying video.

Here’s the blurb on the TED site,

Peter Weyland has been a magnet for controversy since he announced his intent to build the first convincingly humanoid robotic system by the end of the decade.

Whether challenging the ethical boundaries of medicine with nanotechnology or going toe to toe with the Vatican itself on the issue of gene-therapy sterilization, Sir Peter prides himself on his motto, “If we can, we must.” After a three year media blackout, Weyland has finally emerged to reveal where he’s heading next. Wherever that may be, we will most certainly want to follow.

It continues, giving more backstory on the character of Sir Peter Weyland,

Sir Peter Weyland was born in Mumbai, India at the turn of the Millennium. The progeny of two brilliant parents; His mother, an Oxford Educated Professor of Comparative Mythology, his father, a self-taught software Engineer, it was clear from an early age that Sir Peter’s capabilities would only be eclipsed by his ambition to realize them. By the age of fourteen, he had already registered a dozen patents in a wide range of fields from biotech to robotics, but it would be his dynamic break-throughs in generating synthetic atmosphere above the polar ice cap that gained him worldwide recognition and spawned an empire.

In less than a decade, Weyland Corporation became a worldwide leader in emerging technologies and launched the first privatized industrial mission to leave the planet Earth. “There are other worlds than this one,” Sir Peter boldly declared, “And if there is no air to breathe, we will simply have to make it.”

Here’s your video, all the way from TED blog.