Tandberg Powering Over-the-Top VOD Service for TiVo Customers in Australia and New Zealand

Ericsson-subsidiary, Tandberg Television, said Monday that Hybrid Television Services, the exclusive licensee of TiVo products in Australia and New Zealand, is deploying a complete suite of its software solutions to power a broadband VOD service/portal for TiVo customers in Australia and in New Zealand (note: Hybrid TV last week launched the DVR platform in the latter country). Dubbed CASPA On-Demand, the portal will provide Australian and New Zealand TiVo users with over-the-top access to a range of new-release movies, popular TV shows, free music videos, artist interviews and music concerts, Hybrid TV says. "People want to watch television on the television," Hybrid TV CEO, Robbee Minicola, said in a prepared statement. "This is not only broadcast TV--but also includes TV content delivered over broadband. By enabling VOD movies and television content within the TiVo service, we are giving our customers more than free-to-air television...we are providing it all without any late fees or trips to the video store. We needed a strategic partner that shared our vision for a personalized, multiscreen TV future. What we did not expect, but experienced first hand, was their professional approach and their willingness to stand, side-by-side with us through the entire process...which often resulted in us all working until the wee hours of the morning."

According to Tandberg, its partnership with Hybrid TV sees the latter using its new WatchPoint Content Management System, its OpenStream Digital Services Platform on-demand backoffice solution, its AdPoint Advanced Advertising Platform and its Xport Producer storage encoding solution. The CASPA On-Demand service will be delivered using progressive download over a subscriber's existing broadband connection, and is intended to complement free-to-air digital terrestrial linear television (note: Hybrid TV's implementation of the TiVo platform supports DTT reception). Tandberg says that it was able to create a working beta of the CASPA portal service within two months and that the service was available for commercial roll-out a month after that.