Envivio Shares Soar On Apple TV-Related Deal

Shares in Envivio closed up more than 7% Tuesday and were soaring beyond the 20% mark in after-hours trading tonight after the video processing specialist said its software-based platform was “powering live HD sports channels on Apple TV” for a tier 1 service provider in Europe.

Envivio didn’t name the provider, but said that those premium channels were being compressed using its Envivo Muse Live encoders and being protected using a “new encryption mode” via its Halo network media processors for delivery to Apple TV devices.

The obvious candidate is BSkyB, which began to deliver sports content for its Now TV OTT serviced on Apple TV boxes in the U.K. last December. In fact, Envivio announced last month that BSkyB’s NOW TV was using Envivio to deliver a “high quality video experience on any device.” A Sky Sports Day Pass on the Apple TV, which requires an Apple ID in lieu of a NOW TV username and password, offers all six Sky Sports channels for £9.99 (US$16.61).

Envivio, through its use of adaptive bit rate compression and video processing for Internet delivered TV , continues “to enhance our solutions by providing support for a broad range of devices and formats, indulging Apple TV and the related content protection technologies," Envivio president and CEO Julien Signès said, in a release.

Envivio is starting to make some hay with tier 1s in the U.S. as well. When it announced fourth quarter results last month, Envivio said Comcast represented 22% of overall revenue in the quarter and 18% of revenue for the vendor’s full fiscal year. Time Warner Cable is also a tier 1 U.S. customer of Envivio’s

Envivio shares closed up 22 cents (7.14%) to $3.30 each on Tuesday. Shares were up 21.52% in after-hours trading.