Virgin Media Q3 2012 Results; 30% of customer base TiVoed; TiVo moving into the Cloud?; Sky Basics on TV Anywhere

The TiVo invasion of Virgin's TV Customer base continues

Virgin Media's Q3 earning results for 2012 revealed that 1.1 million TiVos are now sitting pretty within the Digital Cable Network. 202,000 TiVos were unleashed in Q3, meaning that 30% of Virgin's TV customer base has now been TiVoed.

As for the forthcoming (and much delayed but coming soon in a matter of weeks honest really) iPad app TV Anywhere, Virgin CEO Neil Berkett confirmed (during the conference call - full transcript at Seeking Alpha) that Sky Basic channels will be available for streaming to your PC/Mac, with the possibility of Sky Premium channels to follow:

It will launch with all of our – we have the PC and Mac rights for broadly all of our content. We don’t have quite that number of rights for the tablet. So, there will be some restricted rights. But it will include all of Sky basics initially. And we’re in conversation with Sky in respect to premiums and we’ll continue those conversations over the next six months as we look to renew our premium contract with them.

As for the future development roadmap for Virgin TiVo, its looks like its heading in the Cloud:

We have a roadmap and are in conjunction with TiVo. We represent a significant proportion of TiVo gross adds, well over half, and as such, we’re in constant conversation with them in respect to what the roadmap looks like. The roadmap does look like moving initially the UI to the cloud. The user interface to the cloud and then as we move into the world of DOCSIS 3.1 and further on, we’ll see – we’ll be moving the whole set-top box to the cloud in respect to storage and that will evolve, I’m quite comfortable that the pace in which we’re looking at that is consistent with our peers, if not ahead. Again, it’s why we chose the partner we chose.

The future home for your TiVo recordings?

This would be a huge upgrade for Virgin and TiVo. For instance, the age-old Virgin TV issue of an non-Dynamic EPG would be solved with a cloud-based EPG, which could be updated near-instantly when required remotely. User interface updates (and who knows, maybe even a complete HD interface!) would be far easier to implement.

Hopefully, Virgin and TiVo are thinking beyond a Cloud-based EPG - for instance, your Series Links and Wishlists could be saved into the Cloud, ready to reinstall on a replacement TiVo in case the old one develops a fault.

As for storage, that hints of a Cloud/Networked based PVR system, where every programme on every channel (or the vast majority of them) would be recorded at the national/local headend, ready for you to playback. If we briefly walk around the potential minefield called 'content rights', then one possible advantage of such a system would be infinite recording capacity, which would either replace or supplement the hard drive capacity within your existing TiVo.

Other advantages could include the ability to stream your recordings to any compatible device (without additional transcoding hardware such as the TiVo Stream), and other fancy tricks like the 'live restart' feature currently in use on BBC iPlayer. There's been talk of Apple jumping onto the Cloud-PVR bandwagon and several European Pay-TV platforms have already made that jump. Looks like Virgin Media are looking to join them with TiVo's help.

First video plus more reviews for Virgin Media's TV Anywhere App for TiVo

DaBoz over at Cable Forums was one of the beta testers for the forthcoming (and much delayed) iPad TiVo App, which has been shaped into the Virgin TV Anywhere service. DaBoz has uploaded a video of the app in use at YouTube.

Elsewhere, Gadget Helpline have reviewed the service and the app:

TiVo users will benefit from being able to manage their set top box from the site, adding recordings and managing existing recordings with a few clicks. We can see this being very useful indeed, and can see ourselves logging on quickly while at work to tee up a few recordings for the evening! On demand content can be accessed with ease, with links to the likes of iPlayer coming from the guide.
 
Virgin TV Anywhere launches later this year for iOS, PC and Mac, with the service being free to all Virgin TV subscribers. An Android version of the app will also be coming along next year, and when we pushed about other platforms we were told that other platforms were being considered for the future.

And so have BoxOfficeBuz.Com:

The best thing about the switch from the TiVo menu to the app is the fact that the menu’s are practically the same, if I were to be picky I’d say that the app menu looked a whole lot better than the actual TiVo menu which didn’t appear to hold as much information or perhaps there was more dead space due to the screen size.

iPad App delay for Virgin Media's TiVo down to network connectivity conundrum?

The plot thickens regarding the much delayed iPad app for Virgin Media's TiVo. PaidContent:UK now reports that the app is ready and has been submitted and approved by Apple.

So....where the frack heck is it then?

Well, TiVo doesn't have Wi-Fi built-in, and Virgin aren't a fan of customers having to wire-up their home network to TiVo, and as such are looking for a better way of connecting mobile control device (like the iPad and other tablets) to TiVo, instead of customers downloading the app and then realising that their router is nowhere near their TiVo:

And that poses a big challenge to operators - how can Virgin Media launch its fancy new app experience when it knows it will instantly disappoint thousands of consumers who can’t use it? And how does the company manage requests from customers who want its engineers to relocate their WiFi router or run extra cabling?

Virgin's Nick Ontiveros (TV Strategy, Digital Entertainment) recently explained on the Help and Support Forums that Virgin are looking for a better way to connect TiVos to other devices while talking about the delayed arrival of multi-room streaming (here and here):

....people hate wires, we've found, and not a lot of people have their TiVo right next door to their router. It's not going to help our customers win any interior design awards if we've got CAT 5 running through the home. We're testing through a better way to do it, so when we bring it to market it will be a finished product that everyone can use if they want it.

....With regards to wiring in the home, a lot of people just expect it to work over wi-fi, like AirPlay, or any other type of streaming video. I personally think that wiring people's homes is a really bad idea. It's not forward thinking at all, and the amount it will cost us in expensive CAT 5 will be for a solution that has a 2 year shelf life. The next standard of wi-fi (802.11ac) supports speeds of 500Mbps - it's just the way the market is moving.

I agree that wiring will provide the best experience today, and certainly our solution will be adaptive to respect the customer's wants and take advantage of existing infrastructure, but we want to release a solution that is clean, customer friendly, and flexible. We also have to look beyond box-to-BOX streaming, and onto box-to-device streaming as well. We won't be able to do that with an all wired solution.

So, what options are open to Virgin? Well, there's Homeplugs which I'm a big fan of, and which the likes of BT Vision use in order to allow their customers to watch VOD content when necessary. Then there are Wi-Fi adapters which are available for the stateside TiVo Premiere. In theory, a Wireless N adapter should have enough bandwidth to stream MPEG 2 HD, let alone allow an iPad and a TiVo to chat to each other.

As Nick Ontiveros states, there's 802.11ac, but as a wireless standard its not expected to become standardized until later this year and would require new routers for Virgin's customers.

Meanwhile, the waiting continues. Personally I'd just allow Homeplug owners the option to use them, and the app, while developing an alternative solution. But then I don't run Virgin Media and that's probably a good thing.

iPad app for Virgin Media's TiVo now due in....September??!!?

September. This year. Hopefully.

Another day. Another statement from Virgin regarding the mythical port of the existing iPad app for TiVo. This app was first mentioned way back in December 2010. PaidContent:UK has a pretty good analysis of the timeline for this app's continuing 'development', suffice to say that the new date for deployment is September. That's this year. Hopefully.

Virgin, what is taking so long to deliver apps for your TiVo? Come to think of it, where's the Android app?

PaidContent:UK sums it up nicely:

The Zeebox startup managed to build an iPad TV EPG with built-in social features, contextual show pages and click-to-buy in a matter of months, earning it a partnership that effectively makes it the supplier for such technology to Virgin rival BSkyB.

One more feature Zeebox users enjoy - an integrated TV controller that works with… you guessed it… Virgin Media’s TiVo….

In other words, Sky has beaten Virgin to releasing an iPad app for Virgin.

Virgin Media launches iPhone TV Guide App; Includes remote record for TiVo

Virgin keep pumping out the TiVo-related Apps - we've had the TiVo TV Guide App for Android, a Harry Potter App, and now they've released the iPhone version of the TiVo TV Guide App (Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. Requires iOS 4.0 or later.)