Continuing with its tight string of hearings on telecom reform, the Senate Commerce Committee will hold a hearing tomorrow on the topic of Universal Service Fund Contributions. Universal service is a hotly debated, intensely important telecom policy topic but the complex and broken methods for calculating universal service contributions and distributions are really, really boring.
Still, for those of us who have time on our hands, tomorrow’s hearing will feature the following witnesses:
Glen Post, CEO, Century/Tel
Tom Simmons, Vice President of Public Policy, Midcontinent Communications
Trent Boaldin, President, Epic Touch Co.
Bonnie Cramer, Member, AARP Board of Directors
Paul Garnett, Asst. Vice President Regulatory Affairs, CTIA
Load up on the No-Doz and watch the hearings live on C-SPAN 3, www.c-span.org or on the Senate Commerce Committee’s own web site. (Thanks as always to Peter Kiley.)
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 7:30 PM | Print | Comments (0)
While CBS gears up to deliver mobile video clips, News Corp. is sticking to its cash-generating hipster roots with the launch of Mobizzo today. Mobizzo is a mobile entertainment store that will get the backing of original content created specifically for mobile devices via a News Corp. studio of sorts devoted solely to creating mobile content.
Mobizzo isn’t sticking to one carrier, like other similar initiatives by CBS and NBC. The service is available now on Cingular and T-Mobile and more carriers will be lined up over the coming months. Services are available for $1.99 to $2.99 per download or for a subscription fee of $5.99 month.
And while News Corp. is hoping to leverage its existing entertainment properties (screensavers and audio tones from Fox’s “The Family Guy,” for example), the youth-oriented entertainment giant is also sticking to its innovative roots by expanding into non-traditional — and cheap — content. A celebrity tattoo artist’s work will seemingly be available from Mobizzo, as will a series based on a teen-written comic book available in San Francisco called “Hecter the Collecter.”
The biggest booster of the outre concept? News Corp.’s eminence grise Rupert Murdoch.
So far, Mobizzo has acquired some of its 2,000 pieces of content from the unlikeliest places: a Hollywood tattoo designer, a Chinese art collective and a Los Angeles street artist. Rupert Murdoch, the News Corporation’s chief executive, is so taken with the idea, executives say, that he wants Mobizzo to be a global brand by the end of the year.Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 7:11 PM | Print | Comments (0)
If it’s the last week of the month, then Google must be a hot stock again. Or, if it’s the fourth week after a Google sell-off, Google’s stock must be on an upward trajectory.
Each of those factors could be as good as any other in predicting Google’s popularity among investors. In less than a month following Google’s come-uppance on Wall Street (which sparked a flurry of articles predicting that Google’s heyday is over and likening the Mountain View giant to the dot.com relic Netscape), Google’s stock is again on the upswing.
Google’s stock jumped 3.4% today to close at $390.38, an increase that continues a two-week rally. Over the past couple of weeks, Google’s share price has climbed by over $50. It’s possible that the recent run-up has been driven by Google’s rat-a-tat-tat of new product announcements, including a new online payment service.
It’s also possible that investors are feeling generous toward the company as Google heads into its investor day on Thursday. It’s even more likely, however, that Google is just a financial pendulum that swings whichever way sentiment is blowing.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 6:05 PM | Print | Comments (0)Tivo is in dire straits — the company has largely been written off as a dying hangover of yesteryear now that cable operators and satellite providers use their own, cheaper in-house developed DVR technologies. That’s why the company is drawing up plans to offer free Tivo boxes in exchange for longer term, higher-priced subscription plans, according to this Reuters piece.
CEO Tom Rogers dismisses the idea that Tivo is a has-been — he points to continued growth in subscriptions — but for Tivo to give away its set-tops in the hopes of locking in customers is a sign of limited options at the iconic company.
“We’re continuing to pursue the prospects of zero upfront and all upfront” pricing, Rogers told the Reuters Global Technology, Media and Telecoms Summit in New York. The company is likely to begin the test to offer free boxes, possibly in exchange for higher priced and longer term plans, fairly soon, said Rogers, who was named chief executive last July.Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 5:00 PM | Print | Comments (0)
Bethpage, NY-based cable operator Cablevision Systems issued its Q4 05 earnings results today, showing strong growth across the board and predicting continued strong gains in 2006. But during the Q and A session of its earnings call, President Tom Rutledge said that Cablevision will soon launch its long-anticipated “network” DVR experiment. Cablevision, like Time Warner Cable before it, is interested in launching a DVR service that relies on storage capacity at the head-end rather than the device level, delivering customers greater flexibility and more choice in their DVR options.
But, despite the legality of personal DVRs, the idea of a cable-run network DVR, where the operator has a role in storing video, raises a host of copyright issues. Not, however, according to Cablevision. “We think the copyright for the network DVR is the same as the in-house DVR where the customer uses the video for their own personal use,” Rutledge said.
During Q4 05, Cablevision maintained and even accelerated its industry-topping metrics in terms of digital, high-speed and voice penetration, and has managed to post good growth in basic subscribers, something most cable operators can’t claim.
| Cablevision Systems Operational Statistics | ||
| Basic Subscribers and RGUs | 4Q04 | 4Q05 |
| Homes passed | 4,443,229 | 4,484,000 |
| Basic subscribers | 2,963,001 | 3,026,994 |
| Pro Forma annual sub growth | 0.7% | 2.2% |
| Basic penetration | 66.7% | 67.5% |
| Monthly churn | 1.9% | 1.8% |
| Customer Relationships | 3,078,172 | 3,715,335 |
| Digital Video | 4Q04 | 4Q05 |
| Digital subscribers | 1,483,024 | 1,962,500 |
| Quarterly net sub adds | 145,933 | 119,406 |
| Penetration of total basics | 50.1% | 64.8% |
| Penetration of total HP | 33.4% | 43.8% |
| Monthly churn | 2.50% | 2.2% |
| High Speed Data | 4Q04 | 4Q05 |
| Customers | 1,352,541 | 1,694,334 |
| Penetration of total homes passed | 30.4% | 37.8% |
| Monthly churn | 2.2% | 2.0% |
| IP Telephony Voice | 4Q04 | 4Q05 |
| Customers | 272,688 | 731,341 |
| Quarterly net adds | 83,497 | 130,133 |
| Residential Voice - circuit switched | 4Q04 | 4Q05 |
| Homes marketed | 157,320 | 157,320 |
| Customers | 9,412 | 7,810 |
| Penetration of total homes passed | 0.2% | 0.2% |
| Residential Voice - Total | 4Q04 | 4Q05 |
| Total Residential Telephony Subs. | 282,100 | 731,341 |
| % of homes passed | 6.3% | 16.3% |
On the high-speed front, Cablevision added 93,900 new modem subs., wrapping up the year with a total of 1.69 million high-speed customers, despite growing competition from Verizon’s fiber-based FiOs high-speed service on Long Island, the key Cablevision service territory.
During the call, Rutledge said that FiOs only overlaps 15% of Cablevision’s footprint, and that in the overlap areas, Cablevision is actually experiencing high-speed and voice penetration that is higher than the company average. If Cablevision is afraid of its telco rival, company executives aren’t showing it. “It’s a situation where they’re building a ‘me-too’ product at great expense,” Rutledge said.
The number of new VoIP customers added during the quarter topped every previous quarter’s net additions, with Cablevision adding 130,133 net new digital voice customers and ending the year with a total of 731,341 total voice customers.
For the first time ever, Cablevision generated more than $100 per basic subscriber in revenue, with average revenue for consumer services per basic subscriber of $100.46 for the quarter.
In terms of 2006, Cablevision is projecting 2% to 2.5% growth in basic subscribers and total revenue and cash flow growth in the mid-teens, consistent with 2005’s performance. From Q4 04 to Q4 05, Cablevision boosted revenue by 14%, from approximately $821 million to approximately $950 million. Cash flow advanced between the two time periods by 16%, from approximately $325 million to approximately $379 million.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 2:54 PM | Print | Comments (0)Richard Siklos has this piece in today’s New York Times about CBS’s announcement of new alert services for mobile phones that will feature video clips. One service, called CBS News to go, will be priced at $.99/month and will deliver five news alerts per day, which ultimately will be customized by the consumer.
The other service, called E.T. to Go, will leverage the company’s Entertainment Tonight program, shipping celebrity-related alerts to mobile phone users at a price of $3.99/month. But those are not the interesting items in Siklos’ article; after all NBC already delivers news clips to cell phones, and all of the networks are hitting the mobile platform with new products, including CBS, which is developing miniature soap operas, or mobisoaps, for cell phones.
Buried deep in the piece, however, is news that CBS is planning a full-fledged network for mobile phones. Citing Cyriac Roeding, the vice president of wireless of CBS Digital Siklos writes that “CBS [is] also developing a TV network for next-generation phones that would allow full streaming of live television.”
While BT in the UK and a few other international mobile companies have announced they will deliver full-fledged video networks for cell phones, this is the first I’ve read of a U.S. programmer or network provider stating this ambition.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 1:18 PM | Print | Comments (0)
The Pew Internet and American Life Project released a report on home broadband adoption in rural America showing that although the rate of broadband take-up has doubled in rural areas, it still lags behind urban and suburban communities. By the end of 2005, 24% of rural Americans were broadband subscribers, compared to just 9% at the end of 2003.
But in comparison to their more densely populated peers, rural communities lagged. In cities and suburbs, approximately 39% of the residents had broadband at home at the end of 2005, up from 22% in 2003.
Other interesting points from the research:
—In both rural and urban/suburban areas, cable modems and DSL were tied just about 50/50 as the mode of broadband access
—“Fixed wireless or satellite” as a percent of all types of broadband access rose from 1% to 5% between 2003 to 2005.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 12:11 PM | Print | Comments (0)
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