Here's a snapshot of what's making waves in the cable world.
Verizon Wireless , the SpectrumCo LLC MSOs and Cox Communications Inc. are fighting a request by consumer pressure groups and several service providers, including Sprint Corp. (NYSE: S), DirecTV Group Inc. (NYSE: DTV) and T-Mobile US Inc. , to provide non-redacted details of their mobile/cable service bundling agreements. The group says they need data as they prepare to comment on Verizon Wireless's proposed purchase of Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum from the MSOs. In a
letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) late last week, the Verizon Wireless/cable group argued that the commercial deal and the spectrum agreement are separate and that the Sprint/DirecTV contingent is merely trying "to gain access to proprietary pricing and marketing information" that they would never have access to in the normal course of business. They also point out that the commercial bundling agreements will remain intact even if license purchase deals are not approved. Verizon Wireless and the MSOs have submitted the full text of the agreements to the U.S. Department of Justice and have agreed to do the same for the FCC. Petitions to deny the AWS spectrum sale are due Feb. 21. (See Sparks Start to Fly in VZ Wireless-MSO Deal.)
Netflix Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX) disclosed in an 8-K document that it agreed to pony up US$9 million to settle claims that it retained customer rental history and personal data illegally. The settlement, which still requires the court's blessing, stems from a 2011 lawsuit alleging that Netflix violated the Video Privacy Protection Act and California consumer laws. (See Netflix Privacy Concerns May Spark Lawsuit.)
Comcast Corp. (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK) is looking to bring an Apple Store-like experience to its retail locations. The MSO is testing out a new Xfinity Store concept in Katy, Texas, where visitors are met by iPad-toting greeters who feed customer data into a queue system so customers can browse the store and use service kiosks while they wait. The MSO plans to bring the concept to new or refurbished stores, reports Houston CultureMap.
Boxee may ask users to pay up to $15 per month for a DVR subscription service, NewTeeVee reports, citing a survey issued to Boxee users over the weekend. Boxee's been non-committal about such an addition, but company CEO Avner Ronen said Friday on a "fireside chat" streamed on the Web that Boxee will see how its new live TV dongle performs before making any decisions about adding a DVR option. "We'll probably do it hopefully this year to support some form of recording or another," he said. (See Boxee Tees Up Live TV Cord-Cutting Tool .)
AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T)'s AdWorks LLC unit has agreed to let TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO) mine anonymous data from U-verse TV subs to help the DVR pioneer generate a better sampling of U.S. television habits. AdWorks is looking to link advertisers with viewership data across mobile, online and traditional TV platforms.
YouTube Inc. channel pages and smoother navigation are among the features Google TV is promising in its latest YouTube app update via the Android Market.
What's making this confusing is that the bundling deals and the spectrum deals are being sorta tied together in this proceeding even though VZ Wireless and the MSOs have insisted that they shouldn't be.
They have agreed to give the details of the commercial agreements (the service bundling piece) to the DoJ and the FCC just to keep the spectrum approval process moving along, but now Sprint, DirecTV, et al, think they need to see all the details of the commercial agreements as well in order to comment on the spectrum sale proceeding.
By arguing that the spectrum deals are separate yet still allowing the DoJ and the FCC to look at the bundling agreements, I think the VZ Wireless/cable side has opened themselves up for this sort of request for access to the unredacted documents, though I'd be surprised if they are successful in getting them. JB
Jerome Tollet, CTO at Qosmos, explains how network equipment vendors and operators deploying SDN and NFV can take advantage of network intelligence delivered by DPI to strengthen products and services.
Wind River VP of Product Management, Glenn Seiler, takes a look the industry's first and only complete NFV software platform designed specifically for the unique carrier-grade and high-performance needs of telecom networks.
Steven Shalita, VP of Marketing, NetScout Systems, Inc., discusses the challenges cable/MSO operators face in assuring the delivery of new IP-based services. Key points include the value of proactively managing performance, and using rich analytics and operational intelligence to better understand service and usage trends, make smarter business decisions and ...
At Mobile World Congress, Gigamon's Director of Service Provider Solutions, Andy Huckridge, and Heavy Reading Analyst Sarah Wallace discuss the 'big data' issues facing carriers and operators today.
Gottfried Winter is the Sales Director at Funkwerk, a German specialist in GSM-r terminals and a long-time partner of Huawei. At CeBIT 2014, Winter talks to Light Reading about this partnership and the integration of enhanced voice trunking, video and data functions.
Shamim Akhtar, Comcast's architect and senior director of network strategy, explains why the cable company is moving to a more distributed network architecture.
Jerome Tollet, CTO at Qosmos, explains how network equipment vendors and operators deploying SDN and NFV can take advantage of network intelligence delivered by DPI to strengthen products and services.
Wind River VP of Product Management, Glenn Seiler, takes a look the industry's first and only complete NFV software platform designed specifically for the unique carrier-grade and high-performance needs of telecom networks.
Steven Shalita, VP of Marketing, NetScout Systems, Inc., discusses the challenges cable/MSO operators face in assuring the delivery of new IP-based services. Key points include the value of proactively managing performance, and using rich analytics and operational intelligence to better understand service and usage trends, make smarter business decisions and ...
At Mobile World Congress, Gigamon's Director of Service Provider Solutions, Andy Huckridge, and Heavy Reading Analyst Sarah Wallace discuss the 'big data' issues facing carriers and operators today.
Gottfried Winter is the Sales Director at Funkwerk, a German specialist in GSM-r terminals and a long-time partner of Huawei. At CeBIT 2014, Winter talks to Light Reading about this partnership and the integration of enhanced voice trunking, video and data functions.
VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger speaks to Heavy Reading about the value of virtualization spanning from the data center to service provider networks to mobile devices.
In early March, Huawei showcased key SDN solutions at ONS 2014. Huawei's presence included technical demos of SoftCOM infrastructure and Huawei experts shared their ideas with industry leaders in SDN and NFV, operators, and analysts.
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