Taking aim at small- and mid-sized cable operators in need of a next-gen pay TV offering, MobiTV said more than 210 networks have signed on for a new, hosted IP video platform that will steer clear of traditional set-top boxes.

MobiTV hasn’t announced all the “major” networks that are on board for its new centralized, multi-tenant video delivery platform – branded as MobiTV Connect -- but did point to a representative group of programmers that includes C-SPAN Networks, Disney and ESPN Media Networks, Fox Networks, Fuse Media Networks, Hallmark Channel, Game Show Network, NBCUniversal, Pac-12 Networks, REELZ, Revolt, Showtime, Outdoor Channel, The Weather Channel, and Viacom. Time Warner and Discovery Communications are among the notables that are absent from the current list.

Under the hosted approach, MobiTV will transport national programming feeds from its centralized platform (the heavy lifting will occur at its facility in Sacramento, with support from points of presence in Atlanta, Ga., and Tennessee) to its MVPD partners. MobiTV will also ingest local broadcast feeds and distribute them for its cable and telco service provider partners.

MobiTV also sidesteps traditional set-top boxes by leaning on apps-based system that works with retail devices such as Roku players and Fire TV devices, web browsers, as well and smartphones and tablets.

MobiTV is also supplying the user interfaces, though the service will carry the MVPD partner’s brand and the MVPD’s individual channel lineups. The managed Connect system will also support the operator’s billing and authentication systems.

MobiTV’s hosted video system emerges as a new option that complements an on-premises version of its managed IPTV platform, and comes on the heels of MobiTV’s partnership with the National Cable Television Cooperative.

RELATED: MobiTV, NCTC Forge Next-Gen Video Deal

“We can basically take the headend infrastructure off their [the cable operator’s] plate, put it in a central location…and service many operators from a single source,” Charlie Nooney, MobiTV’s chairman and CEO, said of the company’s new hosted, multi-tenant version of Connect.

MobiTV’s new hosted angle aims to reduce the capital costs required to create a next-gen pay TV service for tier 2/3 operators, but Nooney said some larger MSOs have also shown interest in the deployment model.

Regardless of the size of the operator involved, the primary focus is to provide those service providers with an economic path to an IP-delivered, multi-screen pay TV service that can help them fend off a cadre of new OTT TV service and a bigger cord-cutting trend.

“It opens up a lot of options for it opens up a lot of options for cable and broadband operators to not only stay in the [pay TV] space but get aggressive in the space,” Nooney said.

As a point of emphasis, the programmers on board with MobiTV have given the nod to the company’s video transport platform, approving elements such as signal quality and security. MobiTV’s system works in tandem with the distribution rights of the pay TV partners that are actually selling the service to the end customers.

“They [the programmers] have approved our technical solution…but we’re not in the content business,” Nooney explained.

Despite some variances in technology approaches, MobiTV is targeting a sector of the cable and pay TV market that’s also being pursued by competitors such as TiVo, Evolution Digital and Adara Technologies.

RELATED: TiVo Goes Device-Agnostic With New Platform for MVPDs

For its part, MobiTV claims that more than 35 pay TV providers, representing a footprint of more than 600,000 U.S. homes, have signed on to deploy the managed service. MobiTV doesn’t plan to announce them until later this summer, but Nooney said the bulk of them are coming way of the company’s NCTC agreement.

RELATED: Evolution Digital Debuts App-Based OTT-TV Platform for Smaller Cable Ops

MobiTV, which is still working on deals with programmers that are not yet on board, intends to launch the new hosted version of its platform by the end of June or early July.

Hickory Telephone, DirectLink, USA Communications, C Spire and Citizens Fiber are among known service providers that are using MobiTV’s on-premises architecture to deliver IPTV services. It's possible that some of them will migrate to the new hosted version of MobiTV's platform. 

RELATED: Citizens Fiber Connects With MobiTV for App-Powered TV Option

beIN Media Group, the unit behind the beIN Sports network, has tapped Metrological to deliver a new integrated TV app experience for several types of set-top boxes.

beIN is using Metrological’s framework to bring its TV app experience to satellite and IP legacy and newer OTT-based set-tops for consumers in the Middle East, Turkey and North Africa.

“Metrological has made it painless for us to bring compelling OTT services and app content to our viewers on our set-top boxes,” Mohammed Al Subaie, executive director of commercial affairs, at beIN Media Group, said in a statement. “Consumers want the ability to watch what interests them the most and relates to their own viewing experience. Metrological ensures we now have the flexibility to enrich our exclusive services with related content based on personal preference, regional relevance or target group to the content line up, all integrated on the big screen.”

RELATED: Liberty Global Taps Metrological for Netflix Rollout

Metrological uses an app platform and application framework that features an open source browser and software plugins. Other MVPDs and service providers working with Metrological include Comcast, KPN, Liberty Global, NOS, Tele Columbus, Delta and Ooredoo. 

As part of a marketing and retail relationship with Apple, Charter Communications will offer the Apple TV 4K device to its pay TV customers and will back that up with a version of the Spectrum TV app that runs on and is tightly integrated with Apple's TV-connected streaming device. 

Charter’s Spectrum TV app for Apple TV will be introduced later this year and offer pay TV subscribers with access to live channels and “tens of thousands” of VOD programs.

Charter’s Spectrum TV app currently supports several other platforms, including iOS and Android smartphones and tablets, Roku TVs and Roku players, Xbox One consoles, Samsung smart TVs (2012 and newer models), and Amazon Kindle Fire and Fire HDX 2 gen tablets

Charter and Apple haven’t detailed the retail relationship involving the new 4K-capable Apple TV device, but Charter has previously worked with Roku on retail-focused promotions that center on Roku players.

“We are excited to be collaborating with Apple and look forward to be bringing the Spectrum TV App to Apple TV later this year," Charter said in a statement. 

The new Spectrum TV app for the Apple TV, iPhone and iPad will be integrated with Siri. Charter will also be offering the iPhone and iPad as the MSOs moves ahead with its plans to introduce a mobile service that leans on Charter’s MVNO deal with Verizon Wireless. Charter reportedly plans to launch its mobile service, to be called Spectrum Mobile by the end of the month.

RELATED: Charter Testing Mobile Product with 5K Employees

Apple and Charter announced their relationship today during Apple’s WWDC keynote.

Tied in, Apple introduced its newest operating system for the Apple TV, tvOS. The new version of tvOS aims to further simplify the authentication process using a “zero sign-on” feature that detects the user’s broadband network and automatically signs that user in for all supported apps they get through their subscription without having to type in user names and passwords.

Apple said the zero-sign on feature will launch with Charter later this year and expand to other MVPDs over time.

Other MVPDs that have begun to offer their customers Apple TV 4K devices with their services include AT&T’s DirecTV Now, Canal+ in France and Salt in Switzerland, Apple noted.

As part of its preview for tvOS 12, Apple said its 4K-capable TV device will support both Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos. This fall, iTunes will offer what’s being billed as the largest collection of Dolby Atmos-supported movies, with those titles including Dolby Atmos audio for no added charge. 

The tvOS developer preview is available today for Apple Developer Program members. Apple expects to make the new version of tvOS available this fall as a free software update for Apple TV 4K and the Apple TV 4 generation box. 

Apple introduced the Apple TV 4K last fall. 

Starz said it has introduced its streaming app with voice control on Amazon’s Fire TV. 

The integration with Amazon’s Alexa system enables Starz app users to control playback of movies and series, including originals such as Power and Outlander, using their voice.

In addition to being integrated with the Alexa Voice Remote, Starz app users can also pair Fire TV devices with Amazon Echo products and navigate content using far-field voice recognition.

In May, Starz completed a similar integration with Google Home.

Introduced in April 2016, the Starz app supports the premium programmer’s standalone OTT subscription service (for $8.99 per month), as well as its authenticated TV Everywhere offering.

RELATED: Starz Launches OTT Subscription App

In addition to Amazon’s Fire TV, the Starz app is also compatible with Android and iOS mobile devices, Sony Android TV products, Apple TV boxes, Roku players and Roku TVs, Xbox One consoles, and LG and Samsung smart TVs. 

Toys “R” Us failed to invest in its own digital transformation so, after 65 years, they are closing their doors for good.

Among other things, the company cited the ongoing threat of Amazon, Walmart, and Target as contributing to its demise. That these companies allegedly helped suffocate the American retail giant underscores the ruthlessly competitive environment that is the retail industry.

The TV industry is going through a digital transition of its own and some major players will inevitably become victims of disruption in the market. According to the Video Advertising Bureau’s Q1 2018 report, the number of households using only over-the-top streaming services and devices has tripled since 2013, rising to 14.1 million homes (11% of all U.S. TV households).

So what can media companies learn from Toys “R” Us to ensure their businesses don’t follow suit?

Complacency Kills

To survive in the highly competitive world of retail, Toys “R” Us needed to be more than a place to buy toys. Customers wanting the lowest price could go to Walmart. Customers wanting a unique gift or personalized guidance could go to a local boutique (where they would gladly pay a bit more for great service). Toys “R” Us didn’t provide the best value or the best experience, and they didn’t keep up with the times.

Toys "R" Us missed the opportunity to develop its own online customer experience early on. In the early 2000s, Toys “R” Us management didn’t buy into the future of the internet and outsourced their fulfillment to Amazon. This led to people buying toys on the internet in an Amazon world and not a Toys “R” Us world. When Toys "R" Us finally updated and streamlined the user experience for their website in 2017, the damage was already done.

Toys “R” Us CEO Dave Brandon admitted: "Some organizations recognize faster than others there are shifts in the ways customers want to be communicated with and the way customers want to purchase products. It probably took us a while."

A World of Competition, Choice, and Convenience

In the TV industry, there have never been more options. Not only can consumers watch what they want, when they want, where they want, but even from the service they want.

This is where I believe networks need to pay attention.

Toys “R” Us stopped providing customers with a reason to go into their stores and do business directly with them. They offered nothing more than what any customer could get from Amazon, and even pointed them in that direction. By the way, don’t underestimate Amazon as a threat in the TV space either.

If you’re a publisher and I can get your content via Amazon Channels, fuboTV, Sling TV, Pluto TV, or DirecTV Now, why would I used your owned and operated apps? As an Amazon customer, it is easier for me to just get your content through their platform with my existing payment account, and watch all content via a single interface.

Distributing your content to Amazon and other OTT aggregators can be a very successful part of your overall OTT strategy, but it should not come at the expense of your direct-to-consumer apps.

In world of unlimited choice, competition, and convenience, how do you create an experience, so valuable that customers would forgo choice and even convenience to do business directly with you?

Figure this out and direct customer relationships, higher margins, and valuable data and insight await. Don’t figure this out, your company risks becoming the next Toys “R” Us.

Experience is Everything. Get it Right

According to PwC’s Experience is Everything: Here’s How To Get It Rightsurvey, 73% of global respondents point to experience as one of the key drivers that influence their brand loyalties.

“65% of US consumers find a positive brand experience to be more influential than great advertising,” David Clarke, PwC principal and experience consulting leader, explained in the study. “The ‘experience economy’ has ushered in a new B2C mindset, steering brands beyond emphasising products and services to selling rich consumer experiences. Our findings quantify the potential ROI [return on investment] on experience investments, upwards of 16%.”

Bad experiences are driving away customers faster than you think. In the US, the survey results show that even when people love a company or product, 59% of customers say they will walk away after several bad experiences, and 32% would stop doing business with a brand they loved after just one bad experience. In Latin America that number is even higher-- 49% say they’d walk away from a brand after single bad experience.

Final Word

Your OTT brand has more value than the content you own and the number of households you're distributing to. It's time you rise to the occasion, own the experience you create for your customers, and embrace emotional connections, not just commercial ones.

Don’t lose sight of why your brand matters to the world.

Kirby Grines is the founder of 43Twenty, a strategic consulting and intelligence company focused on the OTT ecosystem 

Dish Network said its authenticated Dish Anywhere app has added a key platform with support for Android TV.

The new app supports live TV as well as access to on-demand and recorded content on several Android TV-powered devices, including Dish’s own Air TV Player and Evolve set-top (for hotels), the Mi Box, Nvidia Shield, and Sony Bravia and Sharp Aquos smart TVs.

RELATED: Dish Checks in With Android TV-Powered ‘Evolve’ Device

The move adds a TV-connected platform to Dish’s app ecosystem, and complements its support on other platforms, including Android and iOS mobile devices, web browsers, and Fire TV devices.

“Media players provide easy access to video content, so it’s no wonder one-third of U.S. broadband households own these devices,” Niraj Desai, Dish’s VP of product management, said in a statement. 

You.i TV said it is helping A+E Networks to reach a wide range of TV-connected platforms, starting with a TV Everywhere app for History.

You.i TV said its Engine One will power a new History TVE app that’s based on the React Native development platform, a Facebook-backed open source, cloud-based framework that allows for efficient code-sharing alongside a cross-platform capability that allows for the delivery of high-performance apps spanning both mobile and TV-connected platforms.

You.i TV detailed some of its product-focused work with React Native in December. A+E Networks is its first React Native customer.

RELATED: You.i TV Puts Bigger Target on TV-Connected Platforms

Tricia Cooke, You.i TV’s VP of marketing, said the React Native approach allows app-makers to deliver similar, high-end functionality across multiple platforms rather than taking a lowest-common denominator approach that might limit the app’s functionality (such as on-screen animations and motion-based interface designs) on some TV-based streaming platforms.

A+E Networks is one of five partners that are on board with You.i TV’s early access program for React Native as the vendor works toward commercial avaialbity of an engine that takes full advantage of the app framework.

The History TVE app based on that framework is expected to launch later this year and support several platforms, including iOS, Android, Apple TV, Roku and Amazon’s Fire TV.

The Weather Group, Turner, the National Basketball Association and National Geographic and are among You.i TV’s announced customers

You.i TV announced a $12 million "B" round led by Time Warner Investments in the fall of 2016.

fuboTV, the sports-focused OTT TV service, has introduced an upgraded app for iOS devices that tacks on several new features.  

Among what’s new in the version 4.0 release includes features such as Start Over, Lookback for Sports (replays of days that aired in the last three days); and My Fubo, a section where subs can stream and schedule cloud DVR recordings.  

Also new is an upgraded, faster version of the guide.  

The new release also comes on the heels of the 4.0 launch of fuboTV’s Android app.  

fuboTV announced in October 2017 that it had surpassed 100,000 subscribers. 

Comcast has set April 16-22 for its sixth-annual Xfinity Watchathon and, in a new twist, will offer a subset of programming to internet-only customers, including HBOs Game of Thrones, via the MSO’s Xfinity Stream app for mobile devices and web portal.

This year’s Xfinity Watchathon, a free VOD binge-fest used in part to drive interest in TV series ahead of their season premieres, will offer access to thousands of shows and movies from more than 50 networks, including HBO, Showtime, NBC, and Starz, as well Netflix original series and subscription VOD services that include Dog TV, CuriosityStream and Acorn TV.

RELATED: Acorn TV Nets Comcast Deal

Also part of the mix this year will be two relatively new commercial-free services – AMC Premiere and FX+, Comcast said.

RELATED: Comcast Launches FX+

The offer to internet-only subscribers for a portion of content that is on offer via this year’s Watchathon aims to give them a taste of the VOD fare available through Comcast’s pay TV service and as an apparent enticement to subscribe.

Content available to that internet-only group will include HBO’s Game of Thrones and Westworld; Showtime’s Billions and Homeland; Starz’s Outlander and Power; AMC’s The Terror; Fox’s 9-1-1 and X-Files; Archer (via FX+), and NBC’s AP Bio and Rise.

Comcast noted that the full Showtime catalog will be available on Comcast’s VOD platform and the Xfinity Stream app and portal for a portion of the Watchathon (April 19-22).

The Watchathon web site has also teed up some games related to the initiative, including “TV in Other Worlds,” which tests TV show knowledge by having visitor guess show titles with replaced words.

Last year’s Watchathon, the first from Comcast to include Netflix content, set a record, as customers tuned in to watch more than 77 million hours of VOD fare. Mobile viewing, via the Stream app, rose to 4.5 million hours during last year’s Watchathon.

RELATED: Comcast’s Latest ‘Watchathon Week’ Breaks Another Record

“We love bringing Xfinity Watchathon Week to our customers each year and surprising them with new and unexpected content. This year, we’re really turning up the dial by offering X1 customers a unique opportunity to sample and explore the best programming from dozens of traditional networks and studios, streaming services and emerging SVODs - all aggregated together on the biggest screen in the home,” Daniel Spinosa, vice president, video entertainment services at Comcast Cable, said in a statement. “But we also didn’t want to leave Xfinity Internet customers out of the fun so for the first time we’re inviting them to experience Watchathon Week commitment-free by downloading the Xfinity Stream app or going to the Xfinity Stream portal to get access to a selection of Watchathon Week movies and TV shows on their devices all week long.”

Didja, a company that is focused on OTT apps and services that provide access to local broadcast TV networks, has expanded into Los Angeles.  

That offering, branded as SoCalBTV, is providing access to select local channels to consumers in greater Los Angeles, including the counties of Los Angeles, San Bernadino, Orange, Inyo, Riverside, Kern and Ventura.  

Didja estimates that the app for that market segment, offered on iOS and Android mobile devices and web browsers, is available to more than 5.5 million homes in the southern California.  

Didja offering its apps on a localized basis for free, and selling an optional cloud DVR service for $4.95 per month that includes 1 terabyte of storage.  

The launch of the service in L.A., targeted to consumers who watch TV using an antenna or live in an area where reception is poor or nonexistent, follows earlier pilots in Phoenix, Ariz. (branded as PhoenixBTV), and in the San Francisco Bay Area (marketed as BayAreaBTV). 

Didja obtains rights to carry broadcast TV channels on its apps; it captures the over-the-air TV feeds from partner programmers at a local data center and prepares them for streaming on supported devices in the local region. 

The SoCalBTV offering is launching with a lineup of 34 channels, including Skylink, Azteca, KDOC and LSTV. Lacking is access to local broadcast TV feeds from the Big Four – ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox.  

Didja reiterated that is “committed to adding all local broadcast channels to LocalBTV in all our markets.”  

"Many of our viewers are members of Southern California’s Asian communities, and they depend on us to for news and entertainment programming in their native language," Dennis J. Davis, GM of NRJ Television Stations in Southern California, which has three stations, in the area, said in a statement. "SoCalBTV offers access to our channels on smartphones, which are increasingly used to watch TV by people of all cultures. This method of program delivery helps us reach our audience anywhere they are in the Los Angeles DMA." 

Didja said the next markets in line include Houston; Chicago; Washington, D.C.; and New York City, with launches there expected for later this year. Didja recently raised $12 million to help fund those expansion plans.  

Rich Calacci, Pluto TV’s first chief revenue officer, says his priority is crystal clear as he settles into the new job – create awareness among major brands and ad buyers of the business opportunities that’s now available via the free, linear-style OTT service.  

RELATED: Pluto TV Hires Chief Revenue Officer 

“My number one priority is getting that story to market, not only to get more people on the platform, which I think will happen organically, but to make sure that advertisers are aware of the business opportunities at Pluto TV,” said Calacci, who previously held the same title at Turner-owned Bleacher Report, and had also served as SVP of Turner Sports. 

Pluto TV is not yet broadcasting to the entire world precisely what that story is today, in terms of usage. In Q4 2016, the service said it had crossed 5 million monthly active users, with Pluto TV CEO Tom Ryan telling Multichannel News last May that Pluto TV is “way north of that now.”  

In the “old days” (circa 2010 in this context), an OTT service had to tout a reach of at least 1 million to 2 million people, Calacci said. “That ante’s been quintupled.”  

Pluto TV, which has been expanding its lineup and content partners, delivers more than 100 free, ad-based content channels on several platforms, including Roku players, web browsers, Android TV devices and PlayStation and Xbox consoles, among others. 

RELATED: Pluto TV Lands Content Deals With Lionsgate, MGM, Warner Bros 

Calacci believes that Pluto TV and its curated, linear-style approach using a blend of content from the digital-only and traditional TV worlds can fulfill an important need for advertisers as traditional TV audiences continue to fragment against a surge of OTT video options, including many that are ad-free.  

“The advertiser’s need has not shrunk,” Calacci said. “Their need has actually increased because now they have a more fragmented marketplace by which to tell their story. Having an option like Pluto TV is a huge advantage to them.”  

But Pluto TV’s job now is to sell that story to ad buyers and chief marketing officers, as the service has traditionally been sold through partnership agreements, platform agreements or programmatically.  

The opportunity ahead is bigger, and the plan now is to start selling toward the top 500 brands, Calacci said, noting that Pluto TV offers advertisers “contextual targeting” by clustering its content channels into genres and categories.  

While that will mean selling to key, lucrative segments like the automotive industry, Pluto TV also sees opportunities’ selling to traditional programmers that could use the OTT platform to inform younger audiences about their new programs.  

“Television tune-in is a key part of our business,” he said. “They have to create a lot of noise about the start of a new series or a show. As a category, I think there’s a huge potential there.”  

To help tell the story across those targeted segments, Pluto TV is building out its sales offices, starting in New York and Los Angeles, and then establishing presences in Chicago and, eventually, in Detroit.  

Though Pluto TV is offering a new tool to advertisers, its business is largely centered on 15- and 30-second spots, thought its ad load per hour is far lower than what’s seen with traditional TV, though even that arena is being forced to reconfigure their ad loads.  

RELATED: NBCU Plans to Cut Ads by 10% in Primetime 

Large ad loads that are also saddled with local insertions has created an experience that “is almost untenable” to consumers who are used to ad-free SVOD services from the likes of Netflix and Amazon Prime. “It’s too stark a contrast…There’s far too much commercial interruption in the [TV] viewing experience.”  

On the local side, Pluto TV does have an automated, local ad insertion style product that provides billboard-like content about local weather and news updates that are distributed intermittently based on the user’s location.  

Interactive advertising might also become part of the playbook at Pluto TV, but that opportunity is further out, and not something that the service will be focused on this year.  

CNBC said it has launched an app for devices powered by Android TV.

In addition to the live stream, the authenticated TV Everywhere app also offers full episodes from select business day programming, including Mad Money with Jim Cramer, Squawk Alley and Fast Money, as well as primetime shows such as Secret Lives of the Super Rich, The Profit and Jay Leno’s Garage.

Android TV users can also stream select short form content from CNBC without having to authenticate.

The app also integrates with Google Assistant, which lets users conduct searches by specific CNBC programs, anchors and reporters and topics and people of interest, and also is integrated with its voice navigation system. 

More than a year after the original deal was announced, Comcast has integrated access to hundreds of multicultural channels from Sling TV on the cable operator's X1 set-top box platform.

RELATED: Sling TV to Stream to Comcast’s X1 Platform

Comcast has begun to roll out the Sling TV app to a subset of X1 boxes this week, and expects to have the app available across the rest of the eligible X1 box base in the coming weeks. About 60% of Comcast’s residential pay TV base is on X1 (Comcast ended 2017 with about 21.3 million pay TV subs).

The Sling TV app on X1 boxes will initially offer more than 395 channels from Sling TV’s slate of international programming that includes programming in 21 different languages, including Arabic, Bangla, Bengali, Cantonese, French, German, Hindi, Italian, Kannada, Malayalam, Mandarin, Marathi, Polish, Punjabi, Taiwanese, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu and Vietnamese.

Because the Sling TV app is delivered to X1 boxes via the public internet, that streaming traffic will be subject to Comcast’s internet data usage policies.

RELATED: Comcast Deploys 1-Terabyte Data Plan

Pricing of those Sling TV channels via X1 is the same as they are when purchased directly from Sling TV. Sling TV’s international channels start at $10 per month.

Financial terms of the agreement were not announced. However, Sling TV will own the customer relationship. 

If a customer signs up via X1 they will need to input a credit card during the sign up process that will get charged monthly by Sling TV. Also, existing Sling TV customers will be able to log in and access any of the international live of VOD programming that’s part of their package via X1. New subscribers will be able to sign-up directly through the Sling International app on X1.

Comcast and Sling TV announced the integration deal in November 2016. Though the focus of the deal and the first phase of the roll out centers on Sling’s international channels, the Sling TV app for X1 boxes will eventually support access to Sling TV’s core Blue and Orange multichannel packages.

In a blog post about the Sling TV launch, Rebecca Simpson, executive director of international strategy at Comcast Cable, noted that Sling’s builds on the 60 international channels that X1 already offers to customers separately.

RELATED: OTT Becomes A-OK on the STB

Comcast's integration of Sling TV also expands on similar set-top box integrations previously done with several other OTT-delivered services, including include NPR, iHeartRadio, Netflix, YouTube, and Pandora.

RELATED: Comcast to Stream NPR to X1 Boxes

Citizens Fiber, an independent service provider based in western Pennsylvania, has teamed with MobiTV to introduce a new app-based pay TV option that's supported on a wide range of mobile and TV-connected devices, including Amazon Fire TV streaming sticks.

The rollout, delivered into homes using managed IP connections (not "over-the-top," via the public internet), leans on MobiTV’s Connect platform, eschewing the need for traditional set-top boxes. The deployment also ties into MobiTV’s recently announced commercial agreement with the National Cable Television Cooperative (NCTC).

Citizens Fiber will initially test the platform with a select group of beta users before deploying it more widely this spring. It will support live TV, catch-up TV and network DVR services along with an operator-branded UI that offers recommendations and voice navigation capabilities.

Citizens Fiber, which serves about 3,500 subs in Westmoreland County, Pa. (with expansions into Latrobe and Greensburg underway), is pushing forward with the new app-based pay TV service, using it initially as a supplement to legacy options that include managed IPTV using set-top boxes in partnership with Innovative Systems and an RF-based service built around technology originally from Motorola.

In addition to satellite TV providers and two cable operators – Comcast and Armstrong Cable – Citizens Fiber is now also competing against a new wave of virtual MVPDs that deliver services over broadband to retail streaming devices.

Another aim of the new offering, in addition to getting access to an agile, multiscreen offering, is to cut down on set-top box costs and to get a faster return on pay TV services, said Zachary Cutrell, operations manager at Citizens Fiber, which reached out to MobiTV after learning of the vendor’s earlier work with C Spire.

RELATED: C Spire Launches IPTV Service

“It’s a real game changer for us,” Cutrell said. “We’re ready to jump in because of the cost-savings that this app-based [approach] can offer…We felt the need to jump into this space where we have our own app in the app store.”

Early on the plan is to use the new platform to offer similar pay TV packages that Citizens Fiber offers on its legacy platforms, but is also looking to develop and launch other, slimmed-down offerings that are more targeted to cord-cutters or can be bundled with 1-Gig broadband services. The vast majority of Citizens Fiber’s customers are served on fiber.

Citizens Fiber is still working out all of its subscription models for the new MobiTV-based offering, but in the early going it will charge a technology fee to offset the per-subscriber fee it’s paying to MobiTV.

In addition to enabling the per-subscriber model that sidesteps the upfront equipment costs, Citizens Fiber is also working with Hickory Telephone Company to share in some of the costs to deliver the new TV service.

“We’ve proved that they [MobiTV] have developed a product that can work for small companies,” Cutrell said.

The deployment with Citizens Fiber is an example of early results from MobiTV’s NCTC agreement. In addition to Hickory Telephone, MobiTV has previously said it has also been working with some other NCTC members, including DirectLink and USA Communications.

“This [Citizens Fiber deployment] is one of many that we’re launching right now,” Charlie Nooney, MobiTV’s chair and CEO, said.

He estimates that more than 20 operators have already signed on, and that MobiTV is in contract negotiations with another group that’s at least that size.

RELATED: Android TV Catches the Pay TV Wave

Though MobiTV’s primary focus is on TV apps for retail devices such as smartphones, tablets, Roku players, and Fire TV devices, the company will also support complementary service-provider supplied streaming options.

MobiTV also is not alone in pursuing deals with independent cable operators and service providers, as they are also targets for TiVo, Colorado-based Evolution Digital and Adara Technologies.

RELATED: TiVo Goes Device-Agnostic With New Platform for MVPDs

Disney’s ESPN and Freeform networks will offer their respective apps to Samsung Smart TVs, the companies announced Wednesday.

The agreement calls for the ESPN and Freeform apps to be available to 2017 Samsung Smart TVs beginning today, according to Disney. The ESPN app will be accessible to Samsung Smart TVs made prior to 2017 at a later date, while the Freeform app is currently available to all models, said Disney. 

In addition to today’s launch, the apps are also accessible on computers, smartphones, tablets and streaming devices to fans that receive their video subscription from an affiliated provider, said the company.

ABC Owned Stations Group said it has launched an update to its local news apps that emphasizes live streaming and adds features that drive more viewer customization.

Among the new features, My News lets viewers pick topics and locations they are most interested in following, and a new personalized alert system allows users to opt-in have info on specific topics and locations pushed to them.

The updated local news apps also provide exclusive live video streams, including live news broadcasts, and are now placed more prominently and are available as users navigate through other news content. Viewers also have the ability to toggle between live streams.

Other components include Top News (a curated view of the day’s biggest stories, with breaking news that auto-plays when the app is opened), Explore (a deeper dive into topics such as sports, entertainment and weather-related events, with access to as many as 15 locations), and Weather (dedicated coverage on local weather conditions).

"This is our boldest refresh to date, designed and modernized for the mobile news consumer," Wendy McMahon, the recently announced president, ABC Owned TV Stations Group, said in a statement. "With ‘My News,’ viewers can have a personalized local news experience, programming a feed and opting into alerts around the issues and areas that are most important to them.  The video offerings are also more robust - enabling our audiences to always be connected to the local brands and content they trust.”

ABC Owned TV Stations include WABC-TV, New York; KABC-TV, Los Angeles; WLS-TV, Chicago; WPVI-TV Philadelphia; KGO-TV, San Francisco; KTRK-TV, Houston; WTVD-TV, Raleigh-Durham; and KFSN-TV, Fresno.

Comcast has yanked a feature from its Stream app for mobile devices and web browsers that enables subscribers to schedule DVR recordings remotely.

The removal of that feature comes a few days after the International Trade Commission issued a final ruling that Comcast had violated two TiVo patents, and a “limited exclusion order” that prohibits the importation of certain DVR receivers and software components.

That ruling is now undergoing a 60-day presidential review period. Comcast, which disagreed with the ITC’s ruling, has removed the remote recording feature as it prepares to appeal.

Though Comcast customers currently can’t set recordings remotely on the Stream app, they can still set recordings via the set-top box. Additionally, Comcast customers can still use the Stream app to playback (and download) DVR-recorded content (that component is enabled by X1’s cloud DVR service).  

GeekWire was first to report that Comcast had removed the remote recording feature from the Stream app, and noted that Comcast has yet to update its FAQs (for the Stream app and the Xfinity TV Remote App) to reflect the change.

In the meantime, the ComcastCares Twitter handle has been responding to customers who are confused as to why that feature is currently unavailable.

@XFINITY@comcastcares@comcast What happened to the “Record Program” functionality from the Stream TV app? I no longer have the option to record a show using my phone. What gives? pic.twitter.com/RioWsrGWAs

— Gary Awesome (@wizwit101) November 30, 2017

That functionality has been removed from our apps. If you’re away from your DVR box and cannot schedule a recording and miss a show, check to see if it’s available on XFINITY On Demand! We apologize for the inconvenience.- RO

— ComcastCares (@comcastcares) November 30, 2017

I apologize for the inconvenience. Due to a judicial ruling, we are disabling this feature while we pursue an appeal. - Noah

— ComcastCares (@comcastcares) November 30, 2017

Layer3 TV, the Denver-based MVPD, has launched Shop by Remote, an interactive TV app from HSN.

They said the new capability lets Layer3 TV customers browse for and buy HSN products with the remote control. Those customers can choose size, color and quantity from more than 40,000 items that’s available on the app.

Layer3 TV customers can pay by remote using the credit card they have on file with their HSN account. Layer3 TV has more detail about that app posted here. 

Per HSN’s web site, several other MVPDs and co-ops support HSN’s Shop by Remote app, including AT&T/U-verse, Blue Ridge Communications, Comcast, Optimum (Altice USA), Hawaiian Telecom, Verizon, and the Palmetto Rural Telephone Cooperative, among others.

Layer3 TV said the Shop by Remote app joins other apps that have been integrated on its set-top box platform, including Xumo, iHeartRadio, Pandora and YouTube.

RELATED: Layer3 TV Expands OTT Slate With Xumo

Layer3 TV is available in Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington D.C., Dallas/Ft. Worth, and Denver (Longmont), and has plans to launch in New York. It has not announced subscriber numbers. 

YouTube’s universe of 1.5 billion users continues to migrate more viewing to TV screen.

YouTube is pulling in more than 100 million hours of watch time in the “living room” (read: on smart TVs and via TV-connected devices) each day, up 70% in the past year, Sundar Pichai, Google’s CEO, said Thursday on Alphabet’s Q3 call. YouTube users are also spending 60 minutes a day on mobile, he said.

Pichai didn’t elaborate on what’s leading YouTube’s growth surge in the living room, but in addition to apps on popular streaming platforms such as Roku, Amazon Fire TV and Apple TV, YouTube is also establishing and expanding beachheads on MVPD-supplied set-tops.

RELATED: Comcast Launches YouTube on X1 Boxes

He outlined three areas of focus at YouTube: strengthening its existing community, continuing to drive growth and expanding its subscription businesses.

The latter group includes YouTube Red (on track to release more than 40 originals shows this year) and YouTube TV, the OTT TV service that is making its presence known during this year’s World Series between the Houston Astros and the Los Angeles Dodgers.

RELATED: YouTube TV Lights Up More Markets

Pichai didn’t reveal any sub numbers for YouTube TV, which continues to expand into more markets, but said he is “really excited at the initial reception…We are gathering a lot of feedback, bringing it to more markets, and I'm going to work hard at making the product better.”

Cox Communications said 1 million video subs are now on a new version of its “Contour” platform that is underpinned by Comcast’s cloud-based X1 platform.

RELATED: Cox Inks National X1 Deal with Comcast

Privately held Cox has about 4 million video subs, according to NCTA estimates, meaning that about 25% of the MSO’s pay TV base is on the new offering, which features a cloud-powered guide and a voice remote and integration with apps for mobile devices. That's good news for vendors such as Arris, a key  supplier of X1-based set-top boxes. 

RELATED: Cox Goes Wide With New ‘Contour’

Cox said the rollout was its fastest-ever video product launch, and celebrated the Contour milestone this week, hanging a banner at its headquarters to mark the occasion. Its 1 millionth customer on Contour received a free year of video and internet service and an all-expenses paid trip to Disneyland in California.

Cox also shared some other Contour-related stats, noting that 75% of those customer use the voice remote weekly, and that the Contour app, downloaded more than 1 million times so far, now offers more than 85 linear channels outside the home. Contour also offers more than 70,000 VOD choices, more than doubling that amount since 2016. Some 80% of Contour subs use VOD monthly, and Cox has registered about 275 VOD views on Contour since its debut.

Cox also said Net Promotor Scores for the new Contour are 200% higher than for its legacy offering, and found that customers on that platform tend to stay with the MSO longer.

“The syndication with Comcast is going quite well. The teams are working well together,” Kevin Hart, Cox’s EVP, chief product and technology officer, said in an interview this week that will be part of a larger roundtable set to appear in the Oct. 9 issue of Multichannel News. “We just hit 1 million customers on our Contour 2 platform, so that's a big milestone for us. The NPS is up, customer satisfaction is up, and call-in rates and truck-roll rates are down below our expectations.”

***

LEARN MORE:NYC TV Week is coming up, starting with the 27th annual Broadcasting & CableHall of Fame on Monday, Oct. 16. For more about #NYCTVWK, click here.

Looking ahead, Hart said Cox has OTT service integrations (Comcast has already integrated YouTube and Netflix on its X1 platform, with Sling TV on deck) and a cloud DVR service on its near-term roadmap.

Ahead of the NFL’s regular season kickoff tonight, Comcast and CBS Sports Digital announced a partnership that brings a fantasy football experience to Comcast X1 boxes.

The integration will let Comcast X1 subs access their CBS Sports Fantasy Football league via the TV screen and pull up elements such as league standings, weekly matchups, and real-time stats during live NFL games.

Customers can launch the experience via the X1 sports app or by saying, “Show me my fantasy football team” or “my fantasy football team” into the X1 voice remote.

When opened on X1, the CBS Sports Fantasy Football experience will appear on the right-hand side of the TV and resize the live video.

RELATED: Comcast Expands X1 Sports App Features

The integration follows other OTT-facing apps and services that have been integrated with X1, including YouTube (in trial) and Netflix.

RELATED: Comcast Starts to Test YouTube App on X1 Set-Tops

“This new integration between Comcast and CBS Sports Digital is nirvana for fantasy football fans,”  Preston Smalley, VP of product management for apps, sports and content at Comcast Cable, said in a statement. “Until now, the millions of people in the U.S. who play fantasy sports would track their team’s progress on a separate device splitting their attention from the live play on TV.  By putting everything on the same screen, we’ve created an experience that’s immersive, informative and complete.”

“We’re excited to offer our fantasy players this enhanced experience on Xfinity X1,” added Jeffrey Gerttula, Senior Vice President and General Manager, CBS Sports Digital. “The integration plays right into our focus on offering custom leagues and features for serious fantasy players, who can now seamlessly track their teams while watching games on the same screen.”

AT&T has introduced its own relatively inexpensive tablet that includes a “TV Mode” feature that provides quick access to apps for DirecTV (the authenticated app for the satellite TV service) as well as DirecTV Now, the OTT TV service that debuted last November.   

The Android-powered tablet, called AT&T Primetime, goes on sale this Friday (Aug. 25) online and at AT&T stores for a cost of about $200 -- $10 per month spread out over 20 months with an AT&T installment plan, or $29.99 with a two-year contract.

The specs include a 10-inch Full HD screen, support for dual Bluetooth media streams, Dolby Audio, and a battery that, the company claims, can provide up to 11 hours of usage.

The TV Mode feature provides single swipe access to the aforementioned DirecTV apps from the home screen or lock screen, or by touching the Quick Launch button.

Whether AT&T’s exclusive tablet will amount to much of a subscription driver won’t be known for a while, but it will at least provide another way in the door. AT&T shed about 351,000 “traditional” video subs in Q2, and added 152,000 DirecTV Now subs in the period.

Watch a promo about AT&T Primetime below:

In its latest effort to blend pay TV with OTT, Layer3 TV said it has integrated the iHeartRadio digital music, podcasting and live streaming radio service on all its set-top boxes.

iHeartRadio is the first live streaming radio app offered on Layer3 TV’s platform, which has already integrated Facebook and YouTube, with more apps to come.

The iHeartRadio app, accessible via the Layer3 TV user interface, lets subs search for and playback radio stations based on genre, location or keyword, pick from thousands of live radio stations, including certain local stations, create custom artist radio stations, and receive personal recommendations based on listening habits, location and musical preference.

Layer3 TV has launched service in Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas, and Longmont, Colo., and has confirmed plans to enter the New York market.

RELATED: New York Next on Layer3 TV’s Launch List

“Layer3 TV customers expect us to deliver them the best television experience, but now they can also listen to all their favorite artists, music and local radio personalities thanks to Layer3 TV and iHeartRadio’s innovative integration,” Lindsay Gardner, Layer3 TV’s chief content officer, said in a statement. “On top of over 250 of the top television channels, iHeartRadio brings its seemingly unlimited music offerings into every Layer3 TV customer’s living room.”

“It’s our goal to make sure listeners have access to iHeartRadio everywhere they are, 24/7. This integration is yet another example of giving our listeners access to all their favorite music, radio personalities and stations on the products and services they use most,” added Jessica Jerrick, EVP of business development and partnerships at iHeartMedia.

Other U.S. MVPDs have likewise begun to integrate OTT music services on their pay TV platforms. Among examples, AT&T U-verse also offers iHeartRadio, and Dish Network and Comcast (for X1) have tied in Pandora.

Comcast said Xfinity Stream, an updated version of its authenticated video app that unifies what on-demand and live TV programming that customers are authorized to access when they are at home or on the go, has already been reaping the benefits.

Comcast launched the new app for web browsers and iOS and Android smartphones and tablets  on February 28. Xfinity Stream, which delivers an “X1-like experience,” succeeded the Xfinity TV app and has a content rights engine built in that automatically tells customers which IP-delivered channels are available when they are connected to their home network or when they are out-of-home.  

This unification has led to more out-of-home viewing, according to this recent blog post from Kim Aurand, Comcast’s senior product manager for Xfinity TV mobile and web apps.

“Previously, to access a live channel out of home, customers would need to manually filter the guide to ‘available out of home’,” she explained. “While users of the app can still do this, we also now automatically pivot to an equivalent out-of-home channel when available (labeled "TV Go" in the app). This simple improvement has paid dividends - since launching this enhancement a few months ago, we’ve seen a 27 percent increase in viewing of out-of-home content and increased our app store rating to 4 stars.”

Xfinity Stream on the Apple app store does currently have a four-star rating. At last check, the version of the app for Google Play has a rating of just north of three stars.

The Xfinity Stream, which now offers more than 200 live TV channels for out-of-home viewing, reportedly will also serve as the foundation for a coming service called Xfinity Instant TV that will initially key on broadband subscribers who don’t take a pay TV package from the MSO.

RELATED: Comcast Prepping Q3 Launch of ‘Xfinity Instant TV’

C Spire said an app-powered IPTV service that doesn’t rely on traditional set-top boxes is currently in beta trials and will launch commercially in the “coming weeks.”

C Spire stressed in an FAQ that the new offering, called C Spire TV, is not an “over-the-top” video service that travels the public Internet, but is instead a managed IPTV service that will be available to homes that have access to its FTTP-delivered 1-Gig broadband service in Mississippi.

The new service will support several platforms, including Amazon Fire TV boxes and sticks, Apple TV devices (fourth generation), Android TV devices, Roku players and integrated Roku TVs, iOS and Android mobile devices, and Web browsers.

The new service will start at $65 per month for a “Standard Pack” of channels (all in HD format), with additional packages and services, including premium networks and expanded sports channels, available for $10 and $20 more.

C Spire TV will also support a cloud DVR service, TV Everywhere apps for out-of-home viewing of live and VOD fare, and a Replay TV offering that enable viewers to watch certain shows that aired within the last 72 hours.

Among other bells and whistles, the service will include “skills” for the Amazon Echo voice assistant, and its guide will use machine-learning technology to personalize the experience.

Here’s a short promo video about C Spire TV:

C Spire’s new in-home service, which includes local TV and national cable networks, stems from a partnership with MobiTV, which provides and integrates components such as the content management system, digital rights management, media players, cloud DVR, content policy, billing and authentication.

RELATED: C Spire Teams With MobiTV on Next-Gen TV Service

C Spire’s new offering will succeed a legacy pay TV service, called Super HD TV, that features TVE support, an interactive guide and whole home DVR that was developed in partnership with Innovative Systems.

RELATED: MobiTV Targets a New Opportunity

MobiTV recently landed a new $21 million round of funding  to accelerate and expand MobiTV Connect, a new IP-based, app-powered platform that enables MVPD partners to deliver services on a wide range of smartphones, tablets and TV-connected streaming devices while also sidestepping the need to use traditional set-top boxes.

MobiTV is focusing on that market as cable operators and other MVPD push ahead with IP video migration plans. MobiTV’s competition includes Evolution Digital and Comcast, which has undertaken a licensing strategy that has resulted in deals with Rogers Communications, Cox Communications and Shaw Communications.

RELATED: Rogers to Tap Comcast’s X1 Platform for IPTV Shift

Layer3 TV, the Colorado-based next-gen cable operators, has been offering an IPTV service of its own in select markets and has shown an interest in partnering with municipal providers that lack a pay TV service in their service bundles.

Comet TV, a science fiction broadcast network from Sinclair Television Group and Metro-Goldwyn Mayer, has launched apps for Apple TV (fourth gen) and the current batch of Roku devices.

Those apps will include Comet TV’s live broadcast feed, plus an integrated program guide.

In addition to those apps, Comet TV is still offered on over-the-air broadcast TV in more than 100 markets, as well as on the Web at www.comettv.com.

Comet TV, which debuted on Oct. 31, 2015, features a library of sci-fi fare that includes films such as The Crow, Gattaca and Labyrinth, classic Japanese Godzilla films, and TV series that include Mystery Science Theater 3000, Stargate Atlantis, and The Outer Limits. Stargate: SG1 is set to return to Comet TV in April.

Apps that deliver the pay TV experience on Roku boxes and other retail devices are poised to broaden, not replace the market for operator-supplied set-tops and gateways, Bruce McClelland, Arris’s CEO, said.

“I don’t think of it as an experiment as much as an augmentation to the offer they [MVPDs] have today,” McClelland said Wednesday at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference in San Francisco. “We don’t see it as a replacement approach as much as an augmentation of what they do today.”

The question about the impact of those apps emerge soon after Comcast started to beta test an app for Roku devices, and will soon offer on Samsung smart TVs and will likely support on a broader range of retail platforms in the months to come.

RELATED: Roku, Comcast Kick Off Xfinity TV App Beta Trial

That trend is important to Arris, which now leads the set-top market following acquisitions of Motorola Home in 2013 and of U.K.-based company Pace plc last year.

Though the retail model for MVPDs will certainly grow, operators tell Arris that they “like controlling the technology in the home,” as it helps them differentiate their offer, predict how their services evolve, and enables them to keep tabs on the overall customer experience, said McClelland, who succeeded Robert Stanzione as CEO at Arris  last fall.

RELATED: Stepping Up to the Plate

But he doesn’t expect this gradual trend to alter the core fundamentals of a video CPE business that has been moving to gateway/client architectures that use Lightweight IP devices as well as more powerful boxes with storage and other advanced features. He also sees Arris well-positioned to benefit from “product refreshes” that occur with CPE for video and broadband.

McClelland was also asked about the logic of Arris’s recent warrants agreements with Charter Communications and Comcast.

While noting that such agreements are somewhat unusual, they are beneficial to both sides because they “align our interests” and help to ensure that Arris is investing in the right areas, he said.

RELATED: Charter, Arris Ink Warrant Agreement

“We felt like with acquisition completion of Pace last year that, given the concentration of spend, finding a way to incent our customers to …get comfortable with the level of spend with us was important,” McClelland said.

And they aren’t as unusual as he was letting on, as both Harmonic and Universal Electronics have similar deals in place with Comcast, which also took a small stake in Arris when Arris was pursuing its Motorola Home acquisition.

RELATED: Harmonic, Comcast Strike Warrant Agreement

McClelland also said Arris is ready to pivot as access architectures become more virtualized, disrupt the market, and open the door to new competition.

The challenge for Arris, he said, is to support a graceful migration to new approaches and to be “disruptive to our own business…if the technology takes us in that direction.”

With an eye fixed on the “bigger screen,” Facebook confirmed Tuesday that it will soon roll out an app that is optimized for Apple TV boxes, Fire TV devices and Samsung smart TVs, with more platforms on deck.

Facebook last year rolled out a feature that lets users stream videos from Facebook to the TV, but the new TV app “expands this capability,” Facebook product manager Dana Sittler and engineering manager Alex Li announced in this blog post.

“With the app, you can watch videos shared by friends or Pages you follow, top live videos from around the world, and recommended videos based on your interests. You can also catch up on videos you’ve saved to watch later, as well as revisit videos you’ve watched, shared or uploaded, they explained.

The announcement comes on the heels of report from The Wall Street Journal about the new TV-tailored app strategy, which aims to grab more share of video app dollars.

RELATED: Facebook Tuning Up TV Strategy: Report

Video has continued to become a core focus for Facebook, which has just teamed up with Univision to stream select live Mexican soccer matches.

RELATED: Facebook's Video Focus: Shorter-Form, to Start

Facebook also announced a mixture of video-focused updates, including sounds that “fades in” as users scroll through videos in the platform’s News Feed, a larger vertical video windows on mobile phones, and a feature that lets users minimize a video as they scroll through the News Feed.

Comcast has set the February 28 launch of “Xfinity Stream,” a new app that will succeed the Xfinity TV app and unify the customer's access to content that is authorized for viewing in the home and out-of-home, along with other features in common with the MSO's X1 video service on set-top boxes. 

The free app for iOS and Android smartphones  and tablets and Web browsers will allow Comcast pay TV subs to obtain full access to the in-home TV service, as well as providing out-of-home access to more than 200 live channels, the ability to access and program their DVRs, and a VOD library of about 40,000 titles.

That mix of add-ons and new features will bring an “X1-like experience” on smartphones, tablets and laptops, Comcast said. 

Comcast customers will be able to download the new app for iOS and Android devices on Feb. 28, and those with the latest version of the Xfinity TV app already installed will see it transition to the new app via an update at the end of the month.

Comcast has been asked how this new app related to Stream TV, a new slimmed-down, in-home IPTV service bundle for mobile devices that’s being used as a save tactic and to target cord-cutters, and being tested in Comcast's Boston and Chicagoland markets. 

RELATED: Comcast: Stream TV Is Not ‘OTT’

Update: A Comcast official said the company still expects to roll out the in-footprint Stream TV package nationally later this year, though it will likely be rebranded to help provide some clarify between the new Xfinity Stream app and the name of the slimmed-down TV service package. However, customers who sign on for that soon-to-be-rebranded package will use the Xfinity Stream app to access their subscriptions.

“We’re focused on creating the best entertainment experiences across platforms and continuing to give Xfinity TV customers more choice in how, when and where they access their content,” said Matt Strauss, executive vice president and general manager, video and entertainment services at Comcast Cable, said in a statement. “With the Xfinity Stream app, we are giving customers access to the best content in and out of the home with a growing list of advanced features and capabilities that make the mobile experience nearly identical to the cable experience they enjoy at home.”

Even as some things change as cable operators pivot to IP video, others seem to stay the same.

A prime example is the this week’s beta launch of the Xfinity TV app for Roku devices ahead of a commercial debut that will happen sometime later this year.  Save for some minor limitations like access to transactional content (rental and purchased TV shows and movies), the app provides many of the core features that consumers can get from a Comcast-supplied box for its X1 service.

RELATED: Roku, Comcast Kick Off Xfinity TV App Beta Trial

And while the beta launch represents a step forward for a retail model that will let consumers buy set-top boxes and sidestep leasing fees, it’s still not a giant leap forward for consumers who were hoping that they can avoid all of the fees that typically attached to set-tops that are leased from the operator.

Alongside the good things being said about the trial, a source of much teeth-gnashing and hand-wringing this week was Comcast’s decision to charge outlet fees to customers who decide to use Roku devices as their primary outlet or as an additional outlet once the trial period ends.

Comcast is waiving those fees during the trial, but confirmed that customers will have the option to use the app on Roku devices as a “primary outlet,” and receive a $2.50 credit on their bill (the primary outlet fee is included in the bill), similar to how the operator treats retail devices like TiVo boxes that are outfitted with CableCARDs. Additionally, customers who use a Roku as their secondary outlet will incur an additional outlet charge of $9.95 per month, but also receive a $2.50 credit, reducing that to $7.45. Customers will be able to opt-in for this after the trial, so that will do well to eliminate unwelcome surprises for customers who might not be paying attention to it now.

Comcast reasons that this policy reflects an extension of its current business practices. And while I understand that it makes business sense for Comcast to try to protect that revenue as it considers a possible future in which more consumers will use retail video devices to get their pay TV service from the operator, I have to ask: Is this as consumer-friendly as it could be, or should be?

Here’s my answer: Of course it's not.

Applying outlet policies currently used for retail devices that rely on CableCARDS to the newer apps-based approach for Roku devices can’t be done on an apples-to-apples basis.  On a cost basis, the justifications of reapplying the old CableCARD retail fee model to this new, seemingly more elegant one just don’t seem to add up.

Update: As another important point, Comcast does not charge an outlet fee if a customer accesses the Xfinity TV app in the home via a mobile device, like an iPad or iPhone, or on a Web browser. 

Let’s start with the CableCARD itself, a clunky security module that had one foot in the grave (and the other one teetering upon the edge of it) from a technological standpoint even before the July 2007 mandate took effect that required operators to deploy them in leased boxes while also supporting modules used in retail TiVo boxes and the rare HDTV that had CableCARD slots in them. Because “common reliance.”

There are significant and tangible capital and operational costs associated with the CableCARD, which is why some MSOs lease them. Those modules (and the slots that contain them) cost extra, and slurp up more power than set-tops that use integrated or software-based security/conditional access systems. And that’s just for retail devices. The cable industry, as part of its desire to kill the ban on set-tops with integrated security, has long-complained about high, unnecessary costs that the CableCARD requirement has foisted upon MSO-leased boxes.

And CableCARDs used in retail devices sometimes require truck rolls, and those costs aren’t trivial.

Almost on cue, the NCTA-The Internet & Television Association just issued a report to the FCC that provides an update on the industry’s CableCARD activities during Q4 2016.

Some stats:

-Cablevision Systems (now Altice USA) required pro installs for 28% of its CableCARD deployments, at an average cost of $39.95 per install, and logged 2,450 problems related to CableCARDs in the period.

-Charter Communications said it averaged 1.0 truck rolls to install a CableCARD in that same period, and the average cost for a pro install was almost $50.

-In Q4, Comcast deployed 4,121 new CableCARD installs, of which 1,857 required truck rolls, or 45%, and needed an average number of 1.03 truck rolls to install a CableCARD. The average cost to install a CableCARD was $34.65. In a point in its favor, Comcast does not charge a monthly lease rate for an initial CableCARD.

-Cox Communications required 1.09 truck rolls to install a CableCARD, and has a standard cost for a pro install of $50. Amazingly, Cox reported no CableCARD problems during the period, maybe because it added a role of “Regional CableCARD Liaison” to the process in late 2012 that is tasked with resolving all CableCARD-related issues (from local and corporate engineering, customer service, and the supply chain).

It’s too early to know what the tangible costs will be for the Xfinity TV app offered on Roku devices, the one to come for Samsung smart TVs, and possibly other retail devices further down the road, but I’ll go out on a limb and predict that those costs will be lower than those tied to devices that are weighed down by CableCARDs.

The shift to a retail model that centers on apps and pivots away from the CableCARD will certainly result in fewer truck rolls – that’s been one of the big selling points, right? Granted, Comcast customers will still need to connect their Rokus to a Comcast IP gateway or a “cable service gateway” to make it work, so it’s likely that not all of those people will take the self-installation route. Comcast techs will probably need to pay some of them a visit.

Of course, all of this ranting and raving about outlet fees for retail devices could be for naught as Comcast confirmed that it is evaluating its policies.

But I assert that the right thing to do is to further reduce the primary outlet fee and also reduce or even eliminate the additional outlet fee when customers use Rokus and other devices bought at retail to access their pay TV subscription from Comcast. The same should go for other cable operators.

That would not only be in the spirit of supporting the retail model, and one that the cable industry has insisted should be allowed ride the momentum of the marketplace and not on the wave of another government mandate, it would also provide some added justification for the decision this week by new FCC chairman Ajit Pai to pull a new set-top rules proposal that the cable industry so much wants to avoid.

I understand that protecting a revenue stream is important to any business, but applying these fees, even at a small discount, when the Roku trial ends simply looks bad against that backdrop. Plus, it’s a missed opportunity to do what’s right, if there is true interest in allowing for more consumer choice and supporting and cultivating a market for retail devices that can access a full-freight of MVPD services. 

Facebook is working on a new video-focused app for the Apple TV, set-tops and other TV-connected devices as part of a strategy focused on grabbing more video ad dollars, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Facebook already does some limited app integration on platforms like Comcast’s X1 platform and Roku boxes, but the new strategy appears to have much bigger TV implications.

Facebook has been upfront about interest in evolving into a “video-first” company. “Facebook is “prioritizing putting video first across our family of apps,” company CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on the company’s Q3 call last November. Examples include Facebook Live, Instagram Stories, 360-degree video, and other video-focused activity delivered on its various platforms.

Facebook is scheduled to post Q4 results later today.

RELATED: Video Taking Lead Role at Facebook

But according to the WSJ, Facebook is also talking to media companies about licensing “long-form, TV-quality programming,” holding that a set-top box represents an appropriate conduit for that kind of fare.

Although some Arris investors reacted poorly when Roku and Comcast announced the release of a new app for Roku devices that can be used in lieu of a traditional set-top box, an industry analyst held that it shouldn't have a big effect on Arris’s business with its largest customer.

RELATED: Roku, Comcast Kick Off Xfinity TV App Beta Trial

Arris shares dropped sharply soon after the announcement was made at 1 p.m.  ET today, but the stock quickly recovered. Arris shares closed down 14 cents (0.49%), to $28.58 each Tuesday.

While the news was expected (Roku and Comcast announced plans for the app about nine months ago), the market initially reacted otherwise, Simon Leopold, analyst with Raymond James, said today in a research note with the title: ARRS: The Sky is Not Falling, Roku at Comcast Is Not a Shock.

“Most, including us, see the traditional set top box (STB) as challenged, but offset by the deployment of next generation IP gateways and media boxes along with infrastructure to support them, and today's release does not alter our view on the trajectory,” Leopold wrote. “The initiative does not alter ARRIS' trajectory that includes increased Network & Cloud and Broadband sales while traditional STBs decline.”

And while the model to be employed by Comcast for Roku devices does allow for customers to get almost the full pay TV experience on Roku boxes bought at retail, it doesn’t seem to reflect a massive near-term shift in how the market functions today.

According to Bloomberg, Comcast subs who use a Roku as their primary device (rather than a regular set-top) will get a $2.50 monthly credit. However, the FAQ for the Xfinity TV app being tested on the Roku platform notes that customers won’t be on the hook for equipment charges regarding their use of Roku devices during the trial. But upon conclusion of the test “you will be informed of the charges that will apply for connecting this device with your XFINITY TV service and will have the opportunity to opt in,” it reads.

Update: Comcast clarified that, in or out of beta, there will be no equipment charges for use of the Xfinity TV app on a Roku. But out of beta, other fees associated with a customer’s account would apply, such as additional outlet charges. The company also confirmed that the app will be available to video subs who also subscribe to Gigabit Pro, Comcast's 2-Gig residential broadband service that uses FTTP technology. 

Plus, those Roku/Xfinity TV app users will require an Xfinity IP gateway in their home – something that Arris also makes.

Also factoring into Arris’s favor the decision by new FCC chairman Ajit Pai to pull the plug on proposed new set-top box rules. The industry was already evolving to support retail devices using apps without the regulatory efforts, Leopold added.

He also does not expect the new Roku app from Comcast to have much of an impact on the MSO’s plan to have more than 60%  (in the low-60 percentage range) of its video sub base on X1 by the end of 2017.

RELATED: Comcast Backs Bet on X1

But Leopold speculated that the app, though initially available to customers in Comcast’s traditional service footprint, could position the MSO to compete out-of-region and take on virtual MVPD services like DirecTV Now.

For its part, Comcast has poured cold water on the idea, arguing repeatedly that the economics of an OTT-TV service don’t add up, at least for now.

RELATED: Roberts: ‘OTT Economics Are Unproven To Us’

Comcast has added several Super Bowl-related features to its X1 platform ahead of Sunday’s Super Bowl LI matchup between the New England Patriots and the Atlanta Falcons.

RELATED: Fox Sets Free Super Bowl Stream

Via X1, subs can now watch 30-minute recaps of all Super Bowls, watch highlights from this year’s playoffs, and stream related Web clips several “top” sports networks, and get a sneak peek at some of this year’s Super Bowl commercials.

That showcase is being featured in X1’s Xfinity On Demand area, and can also be pulled up via the X1 sports app or by saying “sports” into the X1 voice remote.  The sports app will also supply real time player and team stats during the game. 

RELATED: Comcast Backs Bet on X1

About half of Comcast’s pay TV base is on X1. Comcast ran a spot showcasing X1 during last year’s Super Bowl that ran on CBS in dozens of the MSO’s local markets.

Update: Cox Communications confirmed that its X1-powered version of its Contour TV service is also supporting these recently introduced Super Bowl-related features.

Roku said it is gearing up to provide a free live stream Super Bowl LI, when the New England Patriots line up against the Atlanta Falcons this Sunday (Feb.  5) at NRG Stadium in Houston.

Roku’s coverage, to be offered via the Fox Sports Go channel on the streaming platform, will include the pre-game show starting at 2 p.m. ET, up until the kick-off at 6:30 p.m. ET.

In addition to also streaming the halftime show with Lady Gaga, the associated Field Pass stream will supply complementary “sights and sounds in the stadium,” Roku said, noting that Roku users will also be able to watch the game with a Sling TV or PlayStation Vue subscription.

Fox is also offering its live, non-authenticated stream of Super Bowl LI at FoxSportsGo.com, as well as apps for iOS, Android, Windows and Amazon tablets, and other connected TV devices such as Apple TV boxes, Android TV-powered devices, Fire TV players, the Google Chromecast, and the Xbox One console. Verizon has the streaming rights for smartphones.

As a first, Fox will work with more than 170 Fox affiliates to deliver local ads via the online video feed of the big game.

RELATED: Fox Sets Free Super Bowl Stream

The streaming bar has been set heading into Sunday’s big game. CBS’s live stream of Super Bowl 50 last year between the Denver Broncos and the Carolina Panthers drew 3.96 million unique viewers across laptops, desktops, tablets, connected TV devices and mobile phones.

Netflix may have enjoyed its best quarter ever from a subscriber standpoint in Q4 2016, but the recent integration of the OTT service on Comcast’s X1 platform only gets a piece of the credit because Netflix saw growth coming in from all corners of the globe.

RELATED: Netflix Ended 2016 With 93.8M Subs Worldwide

“It wasn’t just a Comcast story, in which case it would’ve been domestic only,” Reed Hastings, Netflix’s CEO, said Wednesday on the company’s earnings call. “It’s fundamentally a story about the broad acceptance of Internet TV and the content.”

Comcast launched its integration of Netflix on X1 last November, and the operator is expected to add several more OTT offerings from outside parties to it later this year.  Drama Fever,  a U.S.-based OTT SVOD service, said recently that it’s in talks to integrate its offering on MVPD platforms, with X1 among the most logical candidates.

Hastings, who has previously held that he expects the X1 integration to be of modest help to Netflix, also stressed that the company is a big believer of MVPD partnerships and expects to be doing more of them.

Netflix CEO: Comcast X1 Integration ‘Will Help Modestly’

But he said not all MSOs are positioned technologically to integrate Netflix yet. “X1 is very strong in that way; so is the Dish [Network] receiver,” he said.  “We’re able to operate on ones that are relatively modern and have other IP apps also.” Several cable operators also offer Netflix on TiVo-powered boxes. 

Hastings also talked up how Netflix and its app has been rooted into X1 in a way that still allows the OTT service to shine and control the “post-play experience” that guides viewers to more Netflix shows.

“We look at it as an entry ramp onto our application,” he said. “We feel that our application is the best way to enjoy Netflix content.”

Overall, Netflix contributed its big 2016 growth surge to content and originals that tend to travel well around the world, including Luke Cage, Narcos and The Crown, among others.  Gilmore Girls, for example, has been performing well internationally, Ted Sarandos, Netflix’s chief content officer, noted.

It’s a “cumulative effect” of content, as very few subs join Netflix because of one title, Hastings said. 

Comcast confirmed that it has teamed with ZoneTV to offer Santa Tracker, an Internet app that features a slate of Holiday-themed games, movies and sing-alongs on its IP-capable X1 platform.

The Santa Tracker app, delivered to X1 boxes via the Internet as part of some new Holiday-focused enhancements, just recently appeared in the X1's app section.

Among the features, a movies section provides direct access to more than a dozen holiday and Christmas titles, including Elf, The Polar Express, Home Alone, Jingle All The Way, Jack Frost, and A Christmas Story.

There’s also a Radio section with curated Holiday Favorites, Holiday Kids and Smooth Jazz Christmas songs, a Read Along area with more than 15 titles, including A Penguin Story and The Bears We Know, and a collection of games, including Holiday Sparx, Jolly Dropper and Cookie Crumble.

A Sing-Along area offers 35-plus songs in karaoke mode, including Blue Christmas and Auld Lang Syne, from Stingray Digital.

The Santa Tracker launch appears to be ZoneTV’s first foray onto X1, and its second launch on a platform that is not powered by Ericsson Mediaroom.  ZoneTV, a TV app  specialist headed by former AT&T exec Jeff Weber, recently introduced Santa Tracker on DirecTV’s platform.

RELATED: ZoneTV Lands on DirecTV

Santa Tracker joins a small but growing list of Internet-fed apps to be integrated with X1. Comcast has also tied in Netflix, Pandora and Watchable, Comcast's new ad-based short-form video service. Comcast is also in the process of onboarding Sling TV, Dish Network's OTT-TV service. 

More to come...

Apple’s new “TV” app that aims to be a central, unified hub for separate apps that offer an array of movies and TV shows for streaming has gone live on the Apple TV, Phone and iPad.

 As an aggregated OTT guide of sorts, Apple introduced the TV app in October, hopeful that it will change how consumers watch TV across its devices because they won’t have to constantly toggle between individual apps while also tying in access to the iTunes store and a user’s iTunes library.  

RELATED: Apple Unveils ‘TV’ App

The biggest criticism has been the app’s lack of support for popular streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime. TechCrunch notes that apps from providers such as Hulu and HBO Now are supported at launch. The Verge said the app is being released with iOS 10.2 and tvOS 10.1.

Among early reviews, TechnoBuffalo isn’t impressed with the app because the linkages between the TV app and individual apps can be a confusing mess. But the reviewers it does point out that the new TV app from Apple lets users can integrate access to content from apps from programmers such as CBS, Starz, Showtime, The CW, Crunchyroll and CuriosityStream, and HBO Now, but not HBO Go, the premium service’s TV Everywhere offering.

The debut of the TV app from Apple follows the recent launch of a single sign-on feature for authenticated TVE services, though it initially supports a small smattering of apps from MVPDs and individual programmers.

RELATED: Apple’s Single Sign-On for TV Everywhere Apps Still Hit and Miss

Marking its first launch on a video platform that is not powered by Ericsson Mediaroom, ZoneTV said it has integrated and debuted its first interactive app on DirecTV’s system.

That app, Santa Tracker, arrives amid the holiday season and is being integrated with DirecTV’s electronic program guide. The app supports several interactive elements and components, including a Christmas Countdown Calendar, Holiday-themed movies, “Rudolph Radio,” multiple games, and English- and Spanish-language read-along books and sign-alongs. On Christmas Eve, the app will also show a global map that children can use to tracks the Santa Claus’s progress.

“Combining elements of on-demand, interactivity into a very robust experience, kids can come back continuously,” Jeff Weber, ZoneTV’s CEO, said, hopeful that Santa Tracker is the first of many apps it will offer on the DirecTV platform.

RELATED: Jeff Weber Named CEO of ZoneTV

ZoneTV, a company formerly known as ES3, got its start by integrating apps with Mediaroom, the IPTV middleware platform that Ericsson acquired from Microsoft in the fall of 2013. In addition to AT&T U-verse TV, ZoneTV also has footholds on Mediaroom-powered video platforms from Telefónica, MTS, Hawaiian Telecom, Telus, Frontier Communications and CenturyLink.

ZoneTV, which notched a $4.1 million seed round led by Best Funds about a year ago, has been pushing ahead on a plan to expand beyond Mediaroom. Its launch on DirecTV, acquired by AT&T in July 2015, is its first launch outside of Mediaroom.

RELATED: AT&T Clinches DirecTV Deal

Weber, an exec who previously helped to lead the U-verse division at AT&T, said the Christmas-themed app can run on DirecTV’s HR44 receiver and above, giving it access to the bulk of the boxes/receivers that have been deployed by the satellite operator.

Weber said ZoneTV’s experience in porting “digital-first” apps and content to the set-top is transferable to a wide range of pay TV operator ecosystems.

ZoneTV hasn’t announced where it intends to land next, but possible candidates could include platforms such as TiVo, Comcast’s X1, as well as the next-gen video serving being developed and deployed by Charter Communications in partnership with ActiveVideo. AT&T is also working on a next-gen architecture (subscription required) that aims to bring unity to its IPTV and satellite TV platforms.

RELATED: Arris, Charter Close $135M ActiveVideo Acquisition

“We’ll be able to play in multiple operating systems,” Weber said. “We have really deep expertise in taking digital content into an operator’s environment,” he added, noting that ZoneTV is in talks with “some of the largest cable providers.”

ZoneTV is also moving ahead on a strategy to create “dynamic channels” that can be integrated with an MVPD’s set-top box-based programming guide. Weber said he expects to have more detail to share at CES 2017, which gets underway in January in Las Vegas. 

Comcast said it is adding athlete profiles and more stats and game info to its X1 sports app in time for the start of the new NBA season.

Those additions, which leverage enhancements made to the app for the Rio Olympics, tack on pre-game data, such as team rosters, player profiles and conference standings, alongside in-game, real-time access to team and individual stats such as points, assists, rebounds, shot maps and scoring summaries. The app’s post-game analysis will include a full recap of both teams’ performances.

RELATED: Comcast’s X1 Blends Sports with Interactivity

“We’re also adding voice search to the sports experience within X1,” following similar enhancements added for Comcast’s coverage of the Rio games, Preston Smalley, VP of product, sports and X1 apps, explained in this blog post, noting that subs can use the X1 voice mote to have the sports app pull up game-related data and graphics by saying things like “Philadelphia Eagles stats,” or “Eli Manning touchdowns.”

The new voice feature will be available in the “coming weeks” for football games and will be added to basketball and hockey later this year, Smalley said.

He said more than 35% of Comcast X1 homes “engaged regularly” with the sports app during the Rio games.

Earlier this year, Comcast acquired OneTwoSee, a Philadelphia-based startup that developed some of the technologies that underpin the X1 sports app.

DirecTV will soon put a stop to its support of GenieGO, a device that lets subscribers transfer/sideload shows and movies recorded to the DVR to a tablet, smartphone or PC for later playback.

According to TV Predictions and DTVUSAForum, DirecTV recently sent an email to GenieGO users alerting them that the new DirecTV app will replace the GenieGO, and that DirecTV will no longer support the device after Nov. 4, 2016.

“The DIRECTV App allows you to continue to view your DVR recordings, download DVR recordings, and stream live TV from your receiver to your mobile device. In order to use the full functionality of the DIRECTV App, you will need to upgrade your receiver,” the email explains.

The message also includes an offer for a “complimentary upgrade,” which TV Predictions presumes to mean a new Genie HD DVR that supports the new app.

DirecTV updated its TV Everywhere app last month, offering more than 315 live TV channels and access to content recorded on the subscriber’s home DVR.

The $99 GenieGO was previously known as the Nomad. DirecTV upgraded it in 2013 to support access whether the customer was at at-home and on-the-go when connected to a compatible DirecTV HD-DVR. GenieGO’s storage was limited to about 20 hours of content.

Even as DirecTV pulls back on GenieGO, Dish Network has pushed ahead with HopperGO, a $99 portable video device that lets subscribers take DVR-recorded content with them for offline viewing. HopperGO, which can store about 100 hours of programming and is compatible with the Hopper 3 and Hopper 2, also supports a private WiFi cloud that allows up to five tablets and smartphones to connect via the Dish Anywhere app.

Digital apps, born on mobile phones and nurtured by a nation of finger-tapping millennials, are about to change TV.

The data-packed buttons that dominate the first screens of most smartphones and tablets are about to comprehensively change the way most Americans access video entertainment.

That transformation is already happening, as cable, telco and satellite operators move to consolidate functionalities into their main apps. Eventually, with the proliferation of smart TVs, they’ll look to deliver their entire TV and Internet product suite through their own app, virtually eliminating the need for set-top boxes.

That could be a sea change for the business, as cable operators spend billions of dollars per year on new set-tops and box maintenance. But it’s a shift that could take several years as the cable network moves toward Internet protocol-based technologies.

The key is the set-top box, and the timing of its demise. Big operators like Comcast, with its X1 platform set-tops, and Charter Communications, with its WorldBox technology, are rolling out new set-top equipment that should at least have a multi-year lifespan.

Over the long term, though, the industry wants to move in an IP direction. Accelerating that evolution is the Federal Communications Commission’s move to bring more competition to the set-top industry by “unlocking” the cable box.

BOXED OUT

Since the FCC unveiled its plans to make the set-top market more competitive, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association has countered with its “ditch the box” initiative, an apps-based approach that would make cable content searchable beside over-the-top offerings while protecting copyright, advertising, and contractual arrangements with programmers.

Earlier this month, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler said his final ruling will likely include suggestions from the cable industry. Operators have flirted with an app-based content delivery for the past few years, starting with Time Warner Cable’s IP trial in New York City with Roku in October 2015.

In April, Comcast announced its Xfinity TV Partner Program, which would extend a bridge to retail devices and enable subscribers to access their pay TV service, including live TV, VOD and cloud DVR recordings. At the same time, Comcast announced a deal with Roku that will bring its authenticated Xfinity TV partner app to Roku streaming players and integrated TVs.

Earlier this month, smaller operators got in on the app act, with tiny Mississippi-based wireless company C Spire announcing that it would make all of its video services available via apps, doing away with traditional set-tops later this year.

The C Spire service would target a wide range of platforms, including Roku players, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV and iOS- and Android-based devices, as well as select smart TVs.

Teaming up with Mobi TV, C Spire will begin beta testing the service in November, featuring a full linear TV lineup including local broadcast stations, video-on-demand service, DVRs and a seven-day catch-up service.

For cable operators, apps have evolved significantly since they first came on the scene — essentially as a way for customers to use their smartphones as another TV remote. Today, they have become an integral part of the TV experience, offering not only another way to access programming in and out of the home, but a portal to help resolve customer service issues, change the levels of service and perform functions like programming DVRs.

Altice USA executive vice president and chief marketing officer Matt Lake has been deeply involved in app development since the MSO’s predecessor, Cablevision Systems, first introduced the Optimum apps in 2011. Since that time, Optimum has added customer- service apps (Optimum Support) and an app to help subscribers find the more than 1.5 million WiFi hotspots located throughout its New York metro area service territory.

“The objective is to make this as easy for customers as possible,” Lake said. “In the world of connectivity, it’s about simplifying complexity. What we’ve found is if there are particular needs for a customer out there, an app can potentially solve that.”

Lake said about 2 million customers have downloaded its Optimum TV, Optimum Support and Optimum WiFi apps since the TV app was first introduced in 2011. Today, on average, customers use at least one of the apps 45 times per month. Customers use the app for everything from watching TV — mostly in-home on different devices — to setting up service appointments and troubleshooting service glitches.

Eventually, the intention is to integrate all of those functions and more into a single app, but Altice USA is likely to take a wait-and-see stance regarding set-top replacement.

Instead, Altice USA sees apps as a means to improve the overall customer experience and to make the company stand out in what is an increasingly competitive environment.

“What we’re trying to do is make sure we have a differentiating experience for our customers and separate ourselves from the competition that is out there,” Lake said. “That’s how we tend to look our development eff orts and where we put our investment in terms of the different technologies we pursue.”

But apps aren’t necessarily foolproof. According to The Diffusion Group senior adviser Joel Espelien, there is a hidden danger for distributors that opt to replace set-tops with apps.

“Where this creates pressure for distributors is they will have a hard time encompassing everything into a single app they control,” Espelien said. “MVPDs can ditch the set-top box and create an app that is a virtual set-top box; that is definitely doable. The problem is the consumer has already moved beyond that.

“The MVPD can get rid of the box and get rid of the user experience all together. Then it becomes a billing relationship.”

Espelien added that he sees the app replacement as more of an experimental move, perhaps as an alternative for set-tops that have reached the end of their useful life.

“To do it across the board, I don’t think customers will be with it,” Espelien said. “They will face choices down the road and continue to let set-top boxes age in place.”

Still, other operators are willing to take that risk.

COX ON BOARD

“Unlock the box” is pushing Cox Communications toward more of an app-only environment, executive vice president of product development and management Steve Necessary said. The Atlanta-based MSO has introduced Contour Flex, a skinny-bundle service that can only be accessed on a mobile device via a specific app. Contour Flex began rolling out in July and is available in the majority of Cox markets, he said.

Cox is “absolutely” behind NCTA’s “ditch the box” initiative, Necessary said, and it’s looking closely at Comcast’s move earlier this year to make its X1 platform available through Roku boxes.

“We are very interested in following that activity,” he said.

“Ditch the box” calls for a single HTML5-based app to deliver service — a simple, one-time approach that has been a long time in coming, according to Necessary.

“From a Cox perspective, it’s never been a question of do we want to have apps and deliver our content more ubiquitously — we always did,” he said. “But what was historically one of the very painful realities is that every one of those apps needed to be different.

“When you started to look at the plethora of smart TVs, the wide variety of OTT-connected devices and game consoles [and] the burden that put on companies like Cox to continue to develop these apps and keep them up to date, you rendered them unfeasible,” he said. “Part of the beauty of this [NCTA] approach, is it’s basically one app. You comply with the specifications of the HTML5 spec and it’ll run. That’s a beautiful thing.”

The Contour app “bears a striking resemblance” to Comcast’s Xfinity app, Necessary said — Cox is licensing the X1 platform for Contour — and represents a “step up” for Cox customers.

“It links the customer to the full Title VI service; it’s the full megillah,” Necessary said. There’s one execption, though: Customers are not allowed to purchase transactional video-on-demand movies or shows through the Contour app.

That’s because Apple requires a “pretty steep” fee for any such purchase made through an iOS app, Necessary said. While the same doesn’t hold true for Android, Cox disabled that feature on the Android app to lessen confusion.

“We didn’t want customers to have a different experience based on the platform,” Necessary said.

But Necessary doesn’t see set-tops disappearing anytime soon. That makes sense, as Comcast and Charter are investing large sums in their respective new box platforms — Comcast has said it expects X1 to achieve 50% penetration of its 22 million customers by the end of the year and rolled out 855,000 X1 boxes in Q2 alone. That investment wouldn’t be abandoned immediately, even in the face of onerous regulations.

EVOLUTION, NOT REVOLUTION

“It won’t be abrupt,” Necessary said. “If it necessitates buying a new TV in order for that app to work, TVs have a life cycle. What we would expect to see is a gradual erosion of the market. It’s going to take a while before the market is materially affected.”

That could take as long as five years, Necessary said. In its ditch the box proposal, the NCTA estimated it would take at least two years for new technology to be implemented.

While there is a movement to consolidate entertainment and service apps into a one-stop shop for consumers, Necessary said that is not the path Cox plans to take. In Cox’s research, service and entertainment rarely overlap, he said.

“We have consciously said it’s two different experiences; we’ll have two different apps,” Necessary said. “That’s the logic behind it.”

Dish Network director of advanced video products Mitch Weinraub said he too prefers to keep entertainment and service functions separate. The satellite- TV service provider offers the Dish Anywhere app for content and the MyDish.com website for customer service issues.

“That’s to not get in their way when what they really want to do is watch content,” Weinraub said. “The right place to do things like upgrades and downgrades is probably on the set-top box. Why bring in another device, log into another service, go through another path?

“Going forward, we believe there is a right answer there, and that is to let the customer adjust their content where they consume their content.”

With Cox Connect, customers can access the typical customer-service functions: They can upgrade or downgrade service levels, schedule appointments and track technicians. Earlier this month, Cox added a My WiFi feature to the app that helps customers find WiFi hotspots in their area.

About two-thirds of Cox’s customer base accesses at least one of those service capabilities via the Web or the app each month, Necessary said.

“It tells you about the appetite for having digital interactions from a service and support perspective,” he added.

Earlier this month, Cox added another feature to the support app — My WiFi — that gives customers insights into their WiFi service including performance metrics, signal strength and SSID numbers.

“An ever-increasing number of our customers would rather interact mobile-first rather than call or stop by one of our stores,” Necessary said. “It’s just a lot easier.”

It also adds significantly to an operator’s customer service reputation. In the past three years, Necessary said, Cox has seen about a 15-point swing in its Net Promoter scores associated with the digital service.

“It’s a pretty telling measure,” Necessary said. Apps “are one more way to serve your customer in the way they want to be served.”

HIDDEN COSTS

But there is a cost involved in switching to app-based delivery, mainly in converting plant to IP. That’s something the larger cable operators are already doing to an extent, but it presents a roadblock to smaller operators.

The National Cable Television Cooperative, a programming and equipment-buying group for small cable companies, has been trying to assist in IP conversion and is encouraging eff orts to move towards apps.

NCTC president and CEO Rich Fickle said the organization has been very supportive of members’ app endeavors, and has also started initiatives to help them move to an IP-based infrastructure, another building block in moving toward delivering content via apps.

“OTT and TV Everywhere apps are through the startup phase and appear to be working well for certain devices and content, [but] apps for mainstream TV viewing including highly watched linear are still challenged and may not be ready for the most highly viewed channels on TV in scale but it will eventually happen,” Fickle said.

The main roadblocks, he said, include network loading/quality-of-service management, variations in device processing and memory capabilities, provisioning of localized content alongside national content and variations in supported security and encoding technologies. In the meantime, Fickle said, some set-top boxes might still be needed for a period for many consumers that watch popular content on large screens.

The NCTC continues to be supportive of more innovation in this area. It is encouraging companies to work with the co-op to unlock new benefits such as a seamless multiscreen experience; advanced advertising; near real- time feedback on user experience, features and content; the ability to quickly test new features and content; and flexible packaging based on local viewership data, Fickle said.

But for many smaller operators, apps are more of a vehicle to drive better customer service than deliver content. While many small cable companies have developed their own video content apps, several are opting to leave the entertainment side to TiVo, which agreed to be purchased by Rovi in April for $1.1 billion. TiVo’s app offers a robust feature set including VOD, DVR programmability, and live TV viewing through its own authenticated TiVo app.

At least for now, Mediacom Communications’s app focus will be on customer service, senior vice president, customer service and financial operations Tapan Dandnaik said.

About 288,000 Mediacom customers, or around 20% of its subscriber base, have downloaded Mediacom Connect, the mid-sized operator’s customer service app. For content, Mediacom uses the TiVo app, Dandnaik said.

Mediacom Connect currently allows customers to manage their account, pay their bill and troubleshoot service issues, but the operator has big plans for the app in the near future. It plans to allow customers to track their technician’s location before a service call in the manner of the Uber car-hailing app, and to allow a CSR to activate the camera on a customer’s smartphone to take photos of a problem or engage in a video chat with subscribers to walk them through a solution.

Dandnaik said that while app-based delivery of content is an interesting concept, for some the added cost of converting to an IP-based network isn’t worth the trouble today.

“It all comes down to what is preferred by the customer,” Dandnaik said. “Older customers prefer watching TV traditionally, passively and on a TV screen. Younger viewers are looking at stuff on demand, they watch shows on the go. Anyone can see using apps is more for younger customers. I don’t see that changing anytime soon.”

SLINGIN’ DISH

For other providers, the set-top is an integral part of the app viewing experience. For satellite-TV providers, some type of receiver is needed to accept signals from the dish. But that hasn’t hampered mobility.

AT&T’s DirecTV is planning to launch an OTT service, dubbed DirecTV Now, later this year. For Dish Network subscribers, the promise of a fully mobile TV package is reality through its Dish Anywhere app and its Slingbox-enabled Hopper 2 or Hopper 3 set-tops. Using the Slingbox that is integrated into the set-top, Dish Anywhere customers can access live and on-demand content and can download shows for later consumption.

Unlike other MVPDs that are constrained by rights issues, Dish customers using the Slingbox can access any and all the content they pay for anywhere they can get a wireless signal, as long as their home set-top is powered up.

Weinraub, who runs the team that manages Dish Anywhere, wouldn’t say how many customers have downloaded the app or use it regularly, but he said it is growing in popularity.

“The reason it is growing is that we have more and more customers with those boxes that are capable of doing that with the Hopper 2 and the Hopper 3,” Weinraub said. “As that audience grows, obviously, there are more people that can take full advantage of the unique capabilities that Dish has.

“As they start to understand it, they may download the app to a device and use it for a specific purpose and then they will realize what they have access to,” he said. “Then they become very regular users.”

This story was edited on Aug. 30 to correct an error: Rovi, which is buying TiVo, does not own Roku.

WASHINGTON — Federal Communications Commission chairman Tom Wheeler may have shifted the agency’s position on new set-top box rules as he works toward an order he has said he plans to put to a vote by year-end.

His office had no comment, but FCC staff conversations suggest he could be moving toward allowing programming from third parties to remain under the control of a multichannel video programming distributor (MVPD) app. That’s according to ex parte conversations from Hollywood studios concerned about protecting their content.

PROGRAMMERS’ PUSHBACK

Wheeler has continued to maintain that whatever the FCC does would honor programming contracts and copyright protections, but programmers have remained skeptical.

Democratic commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel has made it clear that the agency will need to shift gears to get her vote, so a move toward a more programmer-friendly approach could be a way to secure it.

According to 21st Century Fox, The Walt Disney Co. and CBS, in ex parte filings following conversations with top Wheeler aides and other FCC staffers, the meetings were sought by the chairman’s office. FCC staff “indicated that they were seriously considering a revised approach to this proceeding that would ensure that all of programmers’ valuable content would remain inside of, and under the control of, apps developed exclusively by multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) with whom programmers have a direct contractual relationship,” the filings said.

Whether cable programming is provided via streams that can be repackaged by third parties or in a separate app that can reside next to others in a search menu has been a major sticking point.

The National Cable & Telecommunications Association describes its approach as “offering a common-denominator app enabling any manufacturer to build a nationally portable device that can receive service from all of the large MVPDs, while continuing to support the market for business- to-business agreements and native apps.”

According to Fox and Disney, which made a joint filing on their meeting, “the commission staff stressed that third-party platforms, when distributing these MVPD apps, would be required to honor and abide by all of the terms and conditions set forth in programmers’ licenses with MVPDs.”

That is the studios’ major ask, so a revised approach with such a guarantee could bring programmers into the set-top rule camp. The chairman’s office declined to comment on the filings or their importance.

But the programmers also said that any third-party content licensing would have to be negotiated directly with programmers.

The FCC’s primary goal, Wheeler has said, is to provide a competitive market for set-tops, given that 99% of boxes are still leased by the cable companies.

A secondary goal, though, is to wed online and traditional video to help make the former a more compelling competitor, another prime component in Wheeler’s mantra of “competition, competition, competition.”

Even as the programmers were meeting with the FCC, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association was taking aim at the force massed against its in-app approach to providing content to third parties. A spokesman declined to comment on whether or not the programmer filings suggested the FCC was moving closer to NCTA’s approach.

“These critics continue to propose complex technology regulations designed to meet their goal of converting copyrighted content into open-source programming for their own commercial use and monetization,” the NCTA said. “Their recommendations would undermine copyright as thoroughly explained by the U.S. Copyright Office, violate consumer video privacy, and impose staggering costs on consumers, networks, program diversity, and innovation.”

COMPROMISE AHEAD?

The Computer & Communications Industry Association — whose members include Amazon, Dish Network, TiVo and Google (a driving force behind the FCC’s “unlock the box” approach to creating a competitive set-top marketplace) — recently offered up what it signaled was its own, more app-centric “compromise” between the FCC’s approach and the NCTA’s app-based plan.

But in a white paper filed with the FCC, the CCIA appeared to keep a thumb squarely on the FCC’s side with the title Unlock the Box: How to Address Opposition and Boost Competition. The CCIA said one solution could be a “digital certificate” for third-party boxes “tied to contractual language pertaining to advertising, channel number preservation, and privacy compliance.”

The white paper reads mostly like a defense of the FCC proposal, echoing old criticisms of the NCTA alternative as “light in detail and heavy with loopholes” and likely to “box out” competition, while the FCC proposal is described as a solution that gives consumers “real choice.”

The CCIA’s plan would still require programming streams to be provided outside an MVPD-controlled app, which is a nonstarter for cable operators.  

LG Electronics USA is nearing the launch of  Channel Plus, a streaming service powered by Xumo that offers a menu of live and on-demand content on the TV-maker’s 2016 lineup of webOS-based smart televisions.

Channel Plus, coming to LG TVs with webOS 3.0, will feature free, ad-supported digital content from partners such as Time, PBS Digital Studios, Wired, Saveur, Cooking Light, GQ and Sports Illustrated, along with channels from BuzzFeed, Mashable, Reuters, FailArmy and Funny or Die. LG said High-quality international channels are also available free of charge for users with international tastes.

Channel Plus, available starting this month with a software update on 2016 LG smart TVs, will offer nearly 50 channels at launch, including some international channels. A channel from the new PeopleEntertainment Network from Time Inc. is slated to launch later this year.

LG said “channels” on the new OTT service look like traditional TV channels and surf them without having to launch them like a separate app.

“By delivering premium Internet content seamlessly with broadcast channels together in the same channel lineup, LG aims to make it easier than ever for consumers to find and enjoy the content they want to watch in one centralized place – whether it’s streaming or broadcast,” David VanderWaal, VP of marketing at LG Electronics, said in statement.

Xumo, an aggregator of ad-based OTT fare, also has integrations with Vizio, Panasonic and Funai Electric, which makes Sanyo-, Magnavox- and Philips-branded TVs in North America. It recently launched a mobile app for iOS, with a version for Android on deck.

Accedo, a maker of multiscreen interfaces, said it has landed up to $10 million in additional capital through a partnership with SEB Private Equity of Stockholm that will be used to accelerate growth and expand product development.  

Accedo said the deal will allow earlier investors in the company, including Industrifonden and Acacia, to exit.

Updated: Accedo has raised about $16M in total, an official said.

Accedo also appointed video industry vet James Ackerman as chairman of the board. Ackerman is late of A&E, BSkyB, OpenTV, and the Documentary Channel. Ackerman recently served as executive chairman of Broadway Systems, an advertising management software company that was acquired by SintecMedia in 2015.

“We’re excited to partner with SEB Private Equity to go to the next level, Michael Lantz, CEO and co-founder of Accedo, said in a statement. “They share our vision of the market development and what a company like Accedo can deliver to truly transform the way consumers experience video services. We firmly believe that we’re still only in the beginning of the transformation of video consumption as we know it and we’re looking forward to continue our 12-year growth trajectory in the future.”

“It’s rare to see a transformation of an industry such as what we’re seeing in the TV industry at the moment,” added Ackerman. “The traditional value chain is evolving with new and existing players embracing OTT technologies to reach consumers and monetise video content in new and innovative ways.”

Stockholm-based Accedo has raised $11.27 million, according to CrunchBase. It was founded in 2004. 

Accedo's customers include OSN (a pay TV provider in the Middle East and North Africa); Cinépolis, a cinema chain based in Latin America; Sky Deutschland; and maxdome, an SVOD service in Germany.

NBCUniversal said it has launched the Telemundo Now app for Apple TV, offering access to full seasons, current and past episodes, clips and other programming from the Spanish-language network.

Telemundo Now, an authenticated TV Everywhere app, joins other apps from the NBCU to extend a bridge to Apple, TV, including NBC, USA, Bravo, E!, Syfy, NBCSN and CNBC. NBCUniversal said its TVE effort has seen double digit year-over-year growth in streaming across its portfolio.

Telemundo Now is also offered on other platforms that include iOS and Android mobile devices, Web browers, Windows, Roku players, the Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

 “We are thrilled to bring Telemundo to Apple TV,” said Dina Juliano, NBCU’s VP of consumer product strategy, content distribution, “This expansion of our TV Everywhere portfolio will give audiences a new opportunity to engage with the network and its innovative content, anytime and anywhere.”

NBCU is also part of a group that includes CTAM and Adobe that is backing an industry effort to build a ‘universal’ TV Everywhere sign-in platform/standard for in-home and out-of-home access. Apple is also pushing ahead with a single sign-in platform for TVE apps that will debut this fall. 

Frequency, a firm that aggregates Internet video for distribution on set-tops and mobile devices, said it has secured $11 million in equity financing from a group that includes Liberty Global, YOU On Demand and Oakmont Corp.

Frequency, a Los Angeles based company founded in 2010, said it will use the funds to fuel growth, including international distribution and on the ongoing development of its distribution platform. Frequency claims that it provides Internet video services to over 100 million subs for TV, mobile and OTT operators worldwide.

The company aggregates and distributes content from a wide range of producers and integrates them with several platforms via a single license. According to the company, it can integrate with partner video ad systems, and have those companies sell the ads. It’s already integrated with “most leading” ad platforms and exchanges and can sell, serve and deliver ads on behalf of its distribution partners. Sling TV is among the distribution partners listed on the company’s web site.

Frequency, which timed the announcement with this week’s TV of Tomorrow Show in San Francisco, told Varietythat Ziggo, Liberty Global’s MSO in the Netherlands, will start to offer Web videos from Frequency on set-tops in Q3 2016.

Liberty Global has been eager to fuse OTT content and apps at the set-top level, with UPC Hungary’s integration of YouTube among recent examples. Liberty Global is also pushing ahead with a next-gen cloud-based set-top box/video platform, code-named EOS, that’s expected to enter trials later this year.

Inge Smidts, chief marketing officer at Liberty Global, is joining the Frequency’s board of directors.

The financing “lets us accelerate our growth and expand the reach of our platform for both content providers and operators, globally. We’re delighted to be in business with this great combination of financial and strategic partners to help us drive that growth,” Blair Harrison, CEO of Frequency, said in a statement.

In the U.S., MVPDs have also begun to tie new forms of OTT content at the set-top. Comcast, for example, offers content from Watchable, its new ad-supported, aggregated OTT video service, on mobile devices as well as X1 set-tops. 

Comcast Cable announced two big moves at the top of its technology personnel chain, promoting Tony Werner to president, technology and product, and Sree Kotay to chief technology officer.

Comcast said Werner, most recently EVP and CTO, will continue to oversee all aspects of the MSO’s technology and product organization, including innovation, development and operations. That team  leads the design and development of Comcast’s customer-facing products, including X1, second-screen apps, and home broadband and WiFi. That organization also leads software development, systems engineering, next-generation access networks, cloud computing, technical operations and R&D within Comcast. Werner joined Comcast in December 2006.

“Tony is a visionary innovator, and has been a leading champion of technological evolution at Comcast,” Neil Smit, president and CEO of Comcast Cable, said in a statement. “His team of engineers, developers and software architects create products and experiences that have redefined how consumers experience television and the Internet.”

Kotay joined Comcast in 2007 as chief software architect, where he headed up software strategy, including the development of software and apps for X1 and other key products. In his expanded role, Kotay will lead Comcast’s software and technology strategy, particularly as it relates to new customer-facing products and services, including advanced video and Internet. Kotay will also oversee Comcast Innovation Labs, the company’s advanced research and development group, and helm the integration of quality engineering into all aspects of product development.

“Sree has driven the evolution of Comcast from software consumer to software creator,” Smit added. “Under his leadership, our software engineering team has evolved to become smarter, faster and more efficient. I can think of no better partner with whom to execute Comcast’s technology vision.”

Get more #INTX2016 news.

Float Left, a TV app development division of Olympusat, has unleashed Flicast, an interface/user experience platform targeted to content publishers that are looking to launch direct-to-consumer video streaming services.

Float Left said Flicast pairs a customizable and unified UX with a cloud-based content discovery platform, noting that it’s compatible with TV Everywhere, subscription and ad-supported VOD services, and TV on demand service models, and enables discovery through a mix of recommendations, watchlists, and video browsing history.

Flicast, the company added, supports several streaming platforms, including Roku, Apple TV, iOS and Android mobile devices, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Xbox consoles, Opera TV, and LG and Samsung smart TVs.

At the show, Float Left will demo Flicast at the Olympusat booth (#360).

“With the number of streaming video services growing every day, consumers are overwhelmed with choice,” Float Left CEO Tom Schaeffer said, in a statement .“Content publishers have been struggling to figure out how to keep viewers engaged, drive loyalty, and remain competitive. We developed Flicast to not only help brands reach their audience across the connected ecosystem, but also to engage and retain their viewers through innovative personalized experiences.”

Float Left said it has launched over 250 TV Everywhere and OTT apps across more than 30 devices, and counts clients such as AMC Networks, Fox, CBS Sports, Red Bull, and Viacom.

Metrological, a TV apps company based in the Netherlands, teed up plans for next week’s INTX event in Boston that will focus on a device and software “agnostic” application platform that will include ways for operators to use open source browser technology to boost app performance and to create next-gen user interfaces.

Metrological (booth 1641) noted that it will demo “contextual” app experiences that merge live TV and over-the-top content, enabling operators to present a unified app that mixes all content types on one screen.

Also on show will be an app store that allows MSOs and other partners to launch device-independent, operator-branded TV app stores on set-tops and other connected devices. The company said more than 300 apps are available to operators that tap into Metrological’s Application Platform.

Also on show will be its Dashboard, which provides real‐time business intelligence and analytics for operators and content providers, and an App Manager, that helps operators monetize OTT content and personalize the scheduling of content. For example, daytime programming can highlight children’s apps while evening hours can highlight news app content.

Last year, Metrological announced that Liberty Global and Comcast were using a new, open-source browser enhancements for set-tops that rely on the RDK software stack. Metrological and RDK Management LLC, the joint venture of Comcast, Liberty Global and Time Warner Cable, introduced an RDK App Emulator last year.