(Light blogging today due to a little holiday time.)
DVR pioneer Tivo, which was headed toward a technology graveyard given that its personal video recording technolgy is being replaced by native DVRs built by cable and DBS companies, is suddenly hot again. First, Tivo re-signed key customer DirecTV for a three-year deal earlier this week, giving the perennially unprofitable company a little bit of a sturdier lifeline. One big caveat to the good news: Tivo had to agree not to sue DirecTV for patent infringement on DirecTV’s own native DVR, which the satellite provider plans to offer later this year, despite the fact that DirecTV’s own DVR could end up supplanting Tivo.
As fate would have it, the deal with DirecTV came just a little too early because today Tivo won a major, major victory when a jury awarded Tivo $73 million in a key patent lawsuit against EchoStar. Tivo had filed suit against the satellite provider for using DVR technology for which Tivo claims it holds the patents.
The jury agreed, and the judge can triple the jury’s award. But, the money in this instance is nothing compared to what Tivo can extract from cable operators and phone companies moving forward if this patent win survives the appeals process. That’s a big if — years and hundreds of millions of dollars could go by before Tivo sees its patent rights solidified. Still, things are looking up for Tivo.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 11:08 PM | Print | Comments (0)
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