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Don't look for a run on TiVo digital video recorders in Canada any time soon. Thanks to differences in cable systems here as compared to the United States, and the inability to come to an agreement with Canadian distributors on a licensing deal, a big move north is not on, said company president and CEO Tom Rogers.
This doesn't mean he's not interested in expanding north, it just might take a while. There's a lot to work out.
The company is in "discussions with various players in the market" but from the CEO's description the talks don't seem to be progressing far. "I'm not sure we're being evangelized (in negotiations). We're being (seen)," he added.
He presented "In Conversation with Tom Rogers" at the Banff World Film Festival on Tuesday.
"We're certainly very interested in what we can do up here," he told Cartt.ca after his presentation.
The TiVo has been available through retail for two years in Canada, but it cannot be properly operated through a cable system here since Canada has not deployed cable card technology.
TiVo boxes in Canada will work in SD, but not HD and face an uphill battle in the Canadian market where all the major distributors offer their own DVRs which work seamlessly.
As a consumer electronics device Stateside, however, "We are neck in neck with the Blackberry," said Rogers, whose company posted its fifth-straight quarterly loss in May. He added, "Next to cars, we are the biggest purchase in the U.S."
He also criticized the industry for not tracking its TV ads better. "TV has got to measure better, especially compared to the data coming out of mobile and the Internet," he stated. "Networks are hugely threatened by that; advertisers need to know return on investment. But if they don"t move in that direction they will hurt."
So you have this huge tension between something they know they need to do and the status quo, he said.
With TiVo Premiere, which Rogers referred to as a media and Internet service, there's more choice, more channels and more control, he stated. The newest TiVo boxes can now tie into cable and also link users to any show in a library at any time (the company has partnered with Netflix and Blockbuster On Demand), and can also connect with other content providers on the web to bring, for example, YouTube videos to users screens. (The service is $12.95/mo.) "It's a new way to watch TV," he said.
In the U.S., Rogers would like to see the cable offering and TiVo merge into one "big deal" with the cable providers. He referred to cable as the rich husband in the relationship, however.
Other tidbits he added to his speech were that old TV time slots don't matter the way they used to, and that no one is doing product placement very well.
Source: Cartt, 06/15/2010
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