Verizon

TiVo has established a brand that is virtually synonymous with DVRs, but has always struggled to capitalize on that brand recognition with consumers. Fortunately, the company has not only built up brand cachet, but also a sizable patent portfolio, and that patent portfolio has been quite useful. In the last couple of years TiVo has forced some big companies to settle patent infringement lawsuits. Last year it was $500M from DISH/Echostar and then another $215M from AT&T. This week, TiVo forced Verizon to cough up some cash. Verizon settled with TiVo for $250.4M. As with the AT&T and DISH/Echostar settlements, there is also a whole lot of patent cross-licensing and marketing agreements bundled in with the settlement, so the possiblity of some Verizon-Redbox love coming to TiVo at some point definitely should not be too surprising. At the same time, be on the lookout for further settlement news as TiVo's continued success has got to be making companies still facing lawsuits from TiVo such as Motorola and Cisco nervous.

TiVo announced today that Verizon will pay it a total of $250.4 million in compensation through July 2018 in order to settle an ongoing patent dispute between the two companies. The companies will also be looking at future combined distribution of streaming video services through Redbox, of which Verizon has a key stake, and TiVo’s DVRs.

Today was an exciting day for Netflix. They launched their first original series, Lillyhammer, and got to watch Redbox unload on them with both barrels. Redbox has risen rapidly in the last few years to become Netflix's biggest competitor in the DVD and Blu-ray rental market, and today Redbox made two major announcements that signal their intention to be even more of a competitive threat in the future. 

The first announcement was a partnership with Verizon to launch a streaming video service. The service will launch in the second half of 2012 and will offer both on-demand streaming and downloads. Verizon will hold a 65 percent ownership share, which makes sense as they will actually be doing much of the heavy-lifting on the backend and are expected leverage their relationships with content providers to help secure much of the content for the service while Redbox brings the brand name and nationwide customer relationships. Though Verizon will undoubtedly position the new service as a feather in their FiOS cap, the service will not be limited to the Verizon network.

Rental kiosk service Redbox is apparently trying to move in on the streaming video market. The company has just announced a joint venture with Verizon that will combine the Redbox DVD and Blu-ray rental business with "video on demand streaming and download service."

The Verge

Hot the heels of their announcement about partnering with Verizon, Redbox also announced that they had purchased NCR's entertainment division, operators of the Blockbuster Express kiosks. The deal reportedly includes all of the Blockbuster Express kiosks, retail contracts, and disc inventories. There is no word how long it will take, but it is only a matter of time before the blue kiosks turn red. Redbox has already shown that it can compete successfully with Netflix's DVD-by-mail service and the NCR announcement only strengthens their position. Combined with the Verizon deal, will Redbox have the arsenal it needs to go toe-to-toe with Netflix on all fronts?

That includes DVD kiosks, retailer contracts and an inventory of discs for stocking the machines. That's big news not only because it expands Redbox's already sizable self-serve rental empire, but because it's doing so at the expense of the floundering Blockbuster, since NCR owns the blue and yellow rental kiosks. 

Engadget