Cox Communications has completed the deployment of Rovi's video-on-demand application, ShowRunner, as part of the Passport interactive program guide across its Motorola systems and plans to bring the feature to its Cisco Systems markets in 2010.
ShowRunner for Passport provides a redesigned interface that provides horizontal scrolling, to allow for quicker navigation through folders; the ability to skip forward or backward in 15-minute intervals while fast-forwarding or rewinding; movie previews available directly from a folder's main menu; and an "instant replay" function to jump back 10 seconds
Cox's upgrade to ShowRunner, combined with additional VOD marketing and promotion at time of launch, has yielded 20% increase in VOD usage, according to the cable operator. As a result, Cox is planning additional rollouts of ShowRunner throughout 2010 with a conversion to the Passport guide for cable systems on the Cisco platform.
"Rovi's ShowRunner has helped us improve the presentation of On Demand to our subscribers," Steve Necessary, Cox's vice president of video product development, said in a statement. "As a result we're pleased to see consumers are accessing and viewing more on demand content and discovering programming they otherwise wouldn't know was available to them as part of their Cox Advanced TV subscription."
Separately, Cox is introducing a new guide, developed with NDS Group, which the cable operator has said will become the primary IPG across its footprint.
Rovi's Passport IPG is deployed across 3.9 million cable homes. The vendor plans to launch several new applications for ShowRunner in 2010, including integrated VOD search; the ability to start and stop VOD program in one room and re-start it in another; and remote selection of VOD content for viewing at a later time.
