TiVo Inc. (NASDAQ: TIVO), a global leader in the advanced television entertainment market, and Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT), a leader in video delivery infrastructure, today announced that they will demo a prototype of their next generation network PVR, fully equipped with an integrated multiscreen solution backend from Harmonic during the International Broadcasting Conference 2013 (IBC) in Amsterdam. A select group of TiVo clients, business prospects, and media will be able to demo the nPVR. This demo marks an important step toward TiVo’s goal to enable cost effective and feature rich paths for operators to transition toward an IPTV solution.
The TiVo network PVR will use TiVo’s Emmy Award winning service delivered from the cloud and is a natural extension of the TiVo solution. This is an important next step for operators as they consider a transition to IP delivered content and utilization of low-cost IP clients and consumer provided devices (tablets, smartphones, etc.) with an eye toward enhancing the user experience inside and outside of the home, which is becoming a critical component in the increasingly competitive video market. TiVo’s network PVR extends the TiVo Service and consistent user experience while enabling consumers to easily find, consume and socially share cloud delivered content through the TiVo user interface.
The foundation of the TiVo service and cloud based architecture enables Pay-TV operators to access a multitude of ‘TV Anywhere’ content, including IPTV, IPVOD, catch-up, start-over and nPVR from the Emmy award winning TiVo service in the cloud on TVs via low-cost IP clients and consumer provided devices (tablets, smartphones, etc.). TiVo’s offering will reduce operator capital expenditures, enable them to manage business rules, including complex content rights and operator policies, and generate a richer, more consistent user experience for their subscribers. As more content and services become cloud-based, TiVo will enable operators to give consumers everything they want, including linear TV and start over with ‘super catch-up,’ a personally tailored interface, unlimited recording capability, multi-screen viewing and the ability to interact with other users on the network. TiVo’s network PVR will also soon offer operators contextual promotional capabilities, social TV and recommendation filtering across disparate libraries of content. TiVo and Harmonic have worked together prior to this initiative. The deployed Virgin TV Anywhere solution in the U.K. demonstrates how the companies enable the transition to IPTV.
The high quality content is prepared using Harmonic’s integrated multiscreen solution. Harmonic brings together the ProMedia Live real-time multiscreen transcoder with enhanced H.264 video codec technology for creating high-quality adaptive bitrate video streams, ProMedia Package adaptive stream preparation application, ProMedia Origin HTTP streaming video server, and Harmonic MediaGrid shared storage to address the demand for video delivery to Internet and mobile devices.
Thierry Fautier, Vice President Solutions & Strategy at Harmonic, said, “As the worldwide leader in video delivery infrastructure, we are thrilled to again collaborate with TiVo and demonstrate here how our best in class ProMedia multiscreen content preparation applications for live transcoding, packaging, and origin server, integrated with our MediaGrid shared storage solution can be used to play an integral role in powering a next generation network.”
Joshua Danovitz, Vice President, Innovation at TiVo, said, “Operators are working to enhance the experience they are delivering to their customers through delivering an experience they love on any screen, while reducing their costs. The TiVo network PVR is just one step toward our goal to support the transition to content everywhere via IP and this prototype serves as an example of the constant innovation that guides our vision to give consumers everything they want, anywhere they want it. Extending the TiVo service to address network storage, as well as enabling the oversight and management of complex content rights and operator policies, is a core strategy in moving operators to a full IP environment and this prototype offering is a clear example of how TiVo can use its deep TV industry expertise to help operators evolve to deliver a cohesive next generation viewing experience. During the project, Harmonic has demonstrated excellence in delivering an enterprise solution that addresses the key infrastructure needed to deploy a full IP solution.”
IBC 2013 runs from September 12-17 in Amsterdam. TiVo’s booth is located at stand number 14.531/hall number 14. Harmonic’s booth is located at stand number 1.B20/hall number 1.
About Tivo
Founded in 1997, TiVo Inc. (NASDAQ: TIVO) developed the first commercially available digital video recorder (DVR). Today TiVo is a global leader in advanced television service for virtually any platform or device. TiVo offers its service directly to consumers, and also distributes its technology and services through solutions tailored for cable, satellite and broadcasting companies. Since its founding, TiVo has evolved into the ultimate single-solution media center by combining its patented DVR technologies and universal cable box capabilities with the ability to aggregate, search and deliver millions of pieces of broadband, cable and broadcast content directly to the television. TiVo also continues to weave itself into the fabric of the media industry by providing interactive advertising solutions and audience research and measurement ratings services to the television industry www.tivo.com.
About Harmonic
Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) is the worldwide leader in video delivery infrastructure for emerging television and video services. The company’s production-ready innovation enables content and service providers to efficiently create, prepare, and deliver differentiated services for television and new media video platforms. More information is available at www.harmonicinc.com.