TiVo links with Brightcove as PC-TV lines blur
Brightcove specializes in tools for publishing and distributing video on the Web. Customers include Farmers' Almanac TV, National Lampoon, Barrio 365 and Shipwreck Central. Late last year, AOL and a few others invested $16 million in the company.
The alliance between the two will automate a way for these publishers to get their goods viewed on TV. Put another way, TiVo is serving as a broadcaster for networks like Expo TV--which concentrates on product news and trade shows--that don't have a time slot, or a good one, on a cable network.
"If it's on Brightcove, you'll be able to watch it on your TV using TiVo," Jeremy Alliare, Brightcove's CEO, said in a statement.
The two companies will phase in content partners and downloading capabilities as time goes on.
Although a household name in North America, TiVo remains one of those companies that analysts perpetually believe will get bought or beaten out by larger competitors. TiVo lost $34.5 million during its 2006 fiscal year, which ended Jan. 31. This was an improvement over fiscal 2005, when it lost $79.8 million, but the pace of new subscriber growth was down compared with the previous year.
Last month, TiVo won $73.9 million in a verdict against EchoStar in a patent case.