TiVo “preparing to split business”
February 27, 2019
By Chris Forrester
DVR specialist TiVo is making progress with its strategic review of its business and is “preparing for the possible separation of the businesses to help address some of those complexities and to potentially facilitate strategic transactions,” according to CEO Raghu Rau.
Rau told market analysts that it now had 55 customers signed up to use its latest TiVo User Experience 4 suite of products, and 50 of these clients had started deploying the product.
“In September [2018] we launched the TiVo BOLT OTA, a premium, 4K Ultra High Definition capable set-top box designed to work with a high-definition antenna. Consumers now have an advanced discovery option available to them regardless of whether they subscribe to a linear pay-television service,” said Rau.
Peter Halt, CFO said that its Q4/2018 revenues were $168.5 million, and below expectations. TiVo’s core business showed $652.4 million in revenues for the full year, down $30 million y-o-y. TiVo reported an operating loss (under GAAP) of $273.5 million.
However, because of the strategic review and potential changes to the company’s structure TiVo is not issuing guidance for 2019.
Asked whether the merger between TiVo and Rovi had been successful, and why the two businesses were now potentially being separated, Rau said the separation that was under review was between the product and IP portions of the business: “TiVo had a strong licensing portfolio, as well as a strong product business. We very successfully integrated the licensing in a portfolio that TiVo had to the portfolio that Rovi had and we have now expanded our portfolio and our licensing prospective customers with both portfolios and enhancing our revenues on the IP front. On the product side, the TiVo business has given us significant product advantages including the IPTV area and the consumer footprint that we’re talking about. In terms of the new experience for that we are rolling out and also this new content network and discovery solution that we have is based on the experience in a full platform and enables us to provide rich content network very unique discovery experience and with multiple endpoints for advertising.”