DVR vendor/service provider, TiVo--which earlier this year announced that it had reached a non-exclusive deal with Comcast to integrate its service with the latter's DVR's--has signed an agreement with another major US MSO, Cablevision. The new deal will see Cablevision test-marketing a package consisting of TiVo DVR service, a wireless router, and Cablevision's Optimum Triple Play service to current satellite customers (note: Optimum Triple Play consists of Cablevision's iO: Interactive Optimum interactive TV-enabled digital cable service; its Optimum Online high-speed data service; and its Optimum Voice VoIP service). The package's wireless router will provide customers with a return path, without the need to use a phone line. "For many satellite customers in our service area, there is significant value in the TiVo product and brand," Cablevision's EVP of product management and marketing, Patricia Gottesman, said in a prepared statement. "Adding TiVo's functionality and service to our current state-of-the-art DVR capabilities offers our customers yet another option in securing the best possible home entertainment experience."
Earlier this week, TiVo announced that it had signed a non-exclusive agreement with regional cable operator, Cebridge Connections, under which the latter will offer TiVo service to its 300,000-strong subscriber base. Cebridge will begin marketing TiVo's service and new standalone 80-hour Series2 DVR's to its customers, starting late September. Cebridge is a member of the National Cable Television Cooperative (NCTC), a purchasing organization that represents over 1,000 independent cable operators, which collectively serve around 14 million subscribers: TiVo recently signed a deal with the NCTC that allows it to offer its service through the latter as a standalone option to NCTC member companies. Cebridge is the second new cable customer that TiVo has acquired through the NCTC partnership: the first was Benton Cablevision of Rice, Minnesota.
The partnerships with Comcast, Cablevision and the NCTC are part of TiVo's ongoing strategy to secure deployment of its service by cable operators, in an effort to make up for the expected decline of the portion of its business that comes from its partnership with satellite TV provider, DirecTV. The latter, whose "DirecTV with TiVo" service currently accounts for around two thirds of TiVo's subscriber base, recently confirmed that it will cease marketing and promoting TiVo service when it launches a DVR of its own later this year (see [itvt] Issue 6.18 Part 3).
Click http://www.itvt.com to subscribe to our free email newsletter, which contains all the news stories you see on this Web site, and additional breaking news and scoops, in-depth features, interviews, and other exclusive content you will not read anywhere else.
