TiVo Casts Its Broadband Lot

[dkennedy]

TiVo Casts Its Broadband Lot

June 7, 2006

Multichannel News Release

TiVo Inc. rolled out a new service Wednesday that will deliver broadband video directly to the TV sets of its digital-video-recorder subscribers.

The company said it has deals for content for its “TiVoCast” service with providers including the National Basketball Association, the Women's NBA, The New York Times, Heavy.com, iVillage Inc. and CNET.

TiVoCast content will be offered free-of-charge to subscribers, and the DVR vendor and its partners will have the ability to integrate advertising within the content.

“The range and quality of broadband video is exploding on the Web, but it's not TV until it is on the TV," TiVo CEO Tom Rogers said in a prepared statement. "With the TiVoCast service, we are once again transforming the television experience by bringing the rapidly expanding array of video content on the Internet into the living room.”

TiVo vice president and general manager of programming Tara Maitra added, “Television is still the preferred platform for watching video. The TiVoCast service captures mainstream and specialty-based content on the Web, delivering programming that is not otherwise available through the TV today and providing a wide variety of choice that will be of interest to all segments of the TV audience.”

[dkennedy]

TiVo diversifies its lineup with Web video

June 7, 2006

By David Lieberman, USA TODAY

NEW YORK — TiVo on Wednesday steps up its effort to erase the line between broadband video and conventional TV — and draw a sharper line between TiVo and in-house cable and satellite digital video recorder (DVR) offerings. It will unveil deals to deliver Web programming from 10 providers for subscribers to watch on their TVs.

"There's this exploding video availability on the Web," TiVo CEO Tom Rogers says. "But for most people it's not real until it's on your TV."

Providing video for the new TiVoCast service will be: the National Basketball Association, The New York Times, CNet, H2O: Hip-Hop on Demand, women's social site iVillage, gay network Here!, action sports network Union on Demand, digital entertainment provider Heavy.com, Danger Rangers kids content and video blog Rocketboom.

TiVo will add the services by the end of July for its subscribers who have their DVRs on broadband networks, about 400,000 of its 4.4 million subscribers, but not to those who subscribe via DirecTV.

The announcement follows TiVo's deal last month to provide Web video from companies affiliated with online service provider Brightcove.

These and other recent enhancements are part of TiVo's effort to raise the bar for DVR services and show consumers that they get more value for the higher prices it charges vs. more basic DVRs from cable and satellite companies. That price imbalance contributed to the lackluster 1.2% growth in TiVo subscriptions in the three months that ended in April. Over the last 12 months TiVo shares have declined 13% to $6.06.

Cable companies remain wary of broadband video, and it won't be part of a DVR service TiVo is building for Comcast and, perhaps, other operators.

But TiVo and its programming partners say they're in on a potentially huge phenomenon. "We've been approached by a large number of video providers," Rogers says. "This is the beginning of a whole new world."

Most of the new shows will be ad-supported and last a few minutes.

For example, the NBA will tip off its service with a four-minute Greatest Moments of the Finals. "Going forward, we'll provide highlights from the (women's) WNBA and then the NBA season," says NBA TV general manager Steve Herbst.

Offerings from iVillage will include Too Sexy for Work? and First Date: You're Wearing That? — people reacting to women's outfits. The deal with TiVo "is one of those surreal offerings that post-modern media companies want to embrace," says iVillage's Peter Naylor. Rogers says that no cash will change hands in the deals, and iVillage says that it will keep 100% of its ad revenue.