RiseStar
March 5th, 2008, 11:44 PM
TiVo has released their latest quarterly report which ended January 31 with a reported net loss of $6.36 million, a significant improvement over the $19.5 million loss the same quarter a year earlier. Revenue fell slightly to $74.1 million, down 3.6%. TiVo service revenue, rose to $58.1 million, up from $57 million a year earlier.
TiVo’s long term future looks brighter, primarily due to a big patent infringement appeals court win in January, which ruled in TiVo’s favor over Echostar Inc. The court upheld the damages, which has now grown to $94 million, as well as upholding the earlier court’s ruling that Echostar must disable DVR services which have been held to infringe on TiVo’s patents.
The substantial award is still being disputed by Echostar, which claims that its latest DVR systems no longer infringe on TiVo’s patents due to a “workaround” software upgrade. At the end of the day, Echostar may have little choice but to license TiVo’s technology or convert its DVR technology to the TiVo platform in order to continue to offer its subscribers DVR services.
The latest legal win should also serve as a wake up call to other pay TV operators which offer their own DVR recording platforms. Many of these may also choose to board the TiVo train in order to avoid similar patent dispute problems. Last year Comcast and TiVo came to an agreement which allows subscribers to access TiVo’s preferred features via a software download. Comcast is continuing to test this with it’s subscribers in New England. A similar agreement is in place with Cox cable, however its service is not yet available.
DirecTV’s decision a couple years back to cease marketing DirecTV-Tivo DVR systems in favor of its own NDS manufactured DVR systems has slowly eroded TiVo’s subscriber base, which is down to 3.95 million from 4.4 million a year ago. However, with NDS now out of the picture with the recent changing of DirecTV’s ownership, TiVo’s relationship may have the possibility of being back in play in the near future.
If TiVo has anything to say about it, the day may come, when it is the only game in town.
TiVo’s long term future looks brighter, primarily due to a big patent infringement appeals court win in January, which ruled in TiVo’s favor over Echostar Inc. The court upheld the damages, which has now grown to $94 million, as well as upholding the earlier court’s ruling that Echostar must disable DVR services which have been held to infringe on TiVo’s patents.
The substantial award is still being disputed by Echostar, which claims that its latest DVR systems no longer infringe on TiVo’s patents due to a “workaround” software upgrade. At the end of the day, Echostar may have little choice but to license TiVo’s technology or convert its DVR technology to the TiVo platform in order to continue to offer its subscribers DVR services.
The latest legal win should also serve as a wake up call to other pay TV operators which offer their own DVR recording platforms. Many of these may also choose to board the TiVo train in order to avoid similar patent dispute problems. Last year Comcast and TiVo came to an agreement which allows subscribers to access TiVo’s preferred features via a software download. Comcast is continuing to test this with it’s subscribers in New England. A similar agreement is in place with Cox cable, however its service is not yet available.
DirecTV’s decision a couple years back to cease marketing DirecTV-Tivo DVR systems in favor of its own NDS manufactured DVR systems has slowly eroded TiVo’s subscriber base, which is down to 3.95 million from 4.4 million a year ago. However, with NDS now out of the picture with the recent changing of DirecTV’s ownership, TiVo’s relationship may have the possibility of being back in play in the near future.
If TiVo has anything to say about it, the day may come, when it is the only game in town.