MobileTV Making Major New Year Moves

Two separate deals unveiled this week hint at major moves within the mobile TV space.

First, the Fox/NBC joint venture Mobile Content Venture signed a deal with MetroPCS - the nation's fifth largest wireless carrier - to integrate the company's mobile digital TV technology into a Samsung-branded smartphone. Metro will offer the new handset with MCV's Dyle Mobile TV service to its 9M-plus subscribers across its footprint.

According to MetroPCS, the smartphone will initially be available in 14 markets including: Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Detroit, Jacksonville, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Orlando, Philadelphia, Sacramento, San Francisco and Tampa. Subscribers who choose the phone will be able to download the Dyle app and register to watch programming aired by broadcast TV stations in those areas.

MCV would not elaborate on the specifics of content, but company brass hinted that more than just Fox and NBC programming would be available. Members of the joint venture include Belo, Cox, E.W. Scripps, Gannett, Hearst, Ion, Media General, Meredith, Post-Newsweek and Raycom.

The release offered by MetroPCS added that MCV has already picked up three more participating broadcasters: Univision, Telemundo and station group Bahakel Communications.

Second, EchoStar subsidiary Sling Media announced that it would team up with Broadcom to develop technology that would allow STB and CE manufacturers to offer fully-authorized mobile video on any device via a wireless internet signal. The companies unveiled plans to integrate Sling's SDK into Broadcom's newest STB on-a-chip (SoC) platform that will give users a multi-screen, multi-platform solution sometime during Q312.

(More news on Broadcom's SoC platform, below.) •

Netflix is How Popular?

Netflix said Wednesday that its customers have watched more than 2 billion hours of streaming video during Q411. The staggering amount, according to one analyst, means the company is now the 15th most-watched TV 'network' in the United States.

Further, if you only count the number of homes that subscribe to Netflix, the service is actually the 2nd most-watched 'network' behind only CBS. How?

According to BTIG's Rich Greenfield, the company's 2B hours/quarter averages to about 666M/hours per month. Analyzing Nielsen data, the analyst found that the major broadcast networks' monthly hours viewed range from 515 million (Fox and NBC) to 600 million for ABC and 700 million for CBS. After the big four (and their affiliate groups), the next-largest networks are Disney Channel (265M), ESPN (210M) and FX (105M).

"Netflix streaming usage is exploding and is far, far bigger than traditional media executives give it credit for," he said. •

Etc.: TiVo $ettles w/ AT&T - NBC Sports Network Eyes ESPN - Bright House Sells U-verse Ads

In Court: TiVo settled its pending litigation with AT&T. Terms of the deal include an initial payment of $51M, followed by quarterly guaranteed payments through 2018 totaling ~$164M. The total payout will top $215M. Said TiVo CEO Tom Rogers: "We are extremely pleased." Ha!

Sports: BleacherReport says NBC Sports Network may not be much now, but as time goes on, expect the network "to steal much of the business that ESPN has." And that's just on the TV side. Read more. --- NYC Comptroller John Liu says Time Warner Cable should reimburse customers who are missing Knicks and Rangers games due to the company's carriage dispute with MSG. --- SBJ says Fox Sports is getting close to signing a deal that would put upwards of 1K hours/year of University of Oklahoma-branded programming in OK, LA, AR and rival turf TX.

Rules & Regs: The FCC is considering legislation that would require commercial TV stations to disclose the corporate interests that fund advertising disguised as news in local news broadcasts. WashPost has the story. --- Despite nearly unilateral opposition to SOPA, Rep. Lamar Smith is defending his bill against the onslaught of criticism. WebProNews has this story with links to Smith's comments and detailed potential threats of the proposed legislation.

Research: MarketsandMarkets says the global smart-TV market will hit $265B by 2016 with a CAGR of 17%. The firm says unit shipments will reach 153.2M by 2016, up from 64M in 2011. --- ABI says iPad users have downloaded ~3B apps since the device's launch in 2010... 19% of all cumulative downloads by Apple users. The firm says the iPhone took more than 2 years to reach the same feat. For the record, ABI says Android tablets have only downloaded ~440M so far.

WebTV: Online social TV start-up YouToo entered a partnership with comedian Pauly Shore for a new campaign the company is calling PeopleMercial (think: social commercial). The experiment will allow viewers to post vids on YouToo.com to win prizes and 15 minutes of fame.

M&A: Google has acquired more than 217 patents from IBM, including ones related to instant messaging and mobile technologies. TheNextWeb has details.

Carriage: Ovation HD launched in the Carolinas and Dallas with Time Warner Cable and in Bakersfield, CA, on Bright House. WOW! launched Ovation and Ovation HD in Chicago; Mediacom added Ovation in the Gulf Breeze FL market.

Deals: Bright House's ad arm Bright House Media Strategies will sell local, regional and national ad spots for AT&T's U-verse in Orlando and Bakersfield in Q112.

Rumor Mill: From MacRumors.com: Apple is considering bidding for the rights to stream English Premier League (EPL) football matches. Reports say the league is 'the type of premium content that will help establish AppleTV in the UK and boost iPad sales, while the iTunes subscription service infrastructure is already in place.'

$$$: Resort-centric PlumTV filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy this week. The company said it will remain in biz but will sell its assets to an investor group. --- The Wikimedia Foundation, which runs Wikipedia, said this week it has raised $20M, the most successful annual fundraising campaign to date. --- Outside our normal coverage but worth a note, WSJ says Eastman Kodak is prepping for chapter 11 bankruptcy as well.

Tech: Broadcom launched an OTT platform at CES this week designed to integrate traditional linear TV from cable and satellite with streaming content via the internet. Highlights of the technology include support for basic hybrid TV and OTT services, on-screen 3D graphical user interface, 3D TV MVC and video conferencing, and dual HD decoding/transcoding for streaming simultaneous video broadcasts to multiple devices. --- Other cable-related news from CES include Civolution announcing its interactive video/ad-to-mobile device technology that syncs mobile video with programming on TV. Read more. --- Roku unveiled its streaming plug-in device that allows the company's STBs to receive internet video through an HDMI port (via WiFi). The OTT company also announced a deal with Best Buy to bundle the device with sales of certain TV sets.

Programming: Hallmark said it is canceling 'The Martha Stewart Show' in May. --- LodgeNet is replacing its own programming promotional channel with ReelzChannel's "Premiere Channel" to promote movies in the company's 1 million-hotel room iTV footprint. --- Discovery Familia is launching 'Peztronauta,' a new eco-friendly children's animated series. --- Comcast Hometown Network said it would air high-school basketball games in Northern and Central California.

SkyREPORT: Observers say the Russian satellite Phobos-Grunt is likely to fall from orbit and crash to Earth. Ironically, Melrae Pictures' "Space Junk 3D" - a film exploring the expanding ring of satellite debris - will open in IMAX theaters starting Jan. 13. Check out the trailer. --- SiriusXM added ~1.7M net new subs during 2011 bringing the company's total to 21.9M to date.

Over, Up & Under There: Contradicting conventional wisdom, Ipsos MORI says viewing video online in the UK is starting to plateau. According to the firm's recent survey, 14.9% of respondents said they watched a TV program on a computer or tablet in Nov. compared to 14.4% from Nov. 2010. --- At the end of 2011, UPC Nederland topped 1M digital TV customers (out of 1.8M total TV subs).

People: Yahoo hired Scott Thompson, former president of eBay's PayPal unit, as the internet company's new CEO. Observers have already noted that Thompson has "zero media, advertising or content experience…" Isn't that how Yahoo makes its money? --- Former News of the World editor Colin Myler, a key figure at the heart of News Corp.'s phone hacking scandal, has been named the New York Daily News' editor-in-chief.

Obituary: Long time cable financial executive David Wicks, 70, died on Dec. 30 of complications following heart surgery.

--- Catch today's media market news in The Evening BRIDGE. •