Every industry has its own small-world feel, and the cable industry perhaps more than most. Enemies and friends disappear and then reappear in new circles. Opponents in one fight end up allies in another. And the once-president of Motorola Mobility joins the Board of Directors for retail rival TiVo.
Such is the case with Dan Moloney. Moloney rose up through General Instruments, and was part of the acquisition of GI by Motorola in 2000. He ran Motorola’s Connected Home business (known by a variety of names over the years), and, after a brief stint as CEO of Technitrol in 2010, took on the role of President at Motorola Mobility when the original Motorola split in two. He left again in 2012 when Google took over, and has largely been off the radar for the last year.
Now Moloney’s back, and he’s on the Board at TiVo.
TiVo and Motorola have sued each other in the past, and Motorola certainly considered acquiring TiVo when the retail company was hot in the mid-2000s. TiVo had popular support, but Motorola had the all-important cable contracts for its DVRs and other set-tops. TiVo wasn’t exactly enemy number one, but TiVo and Motorola weren’t friends either.
Fast forward to today, and Motorola has been swallowed up by Arris, TiVo is one of the cable industry’s best friends, and, as of this month, Moloney is fraternizing with the once-enemy. It’s another episode of As the World Turns for cable.
Welcome back, Mr. Moloney.
Based on what Tivo’s CEO reportedly said at the Goldman Sachs Communicopia Conference this week, there is bitterness with the cable and satellite companies (with the major ones at least). In order for Tivo’s to get a deal with DTV, they gave up their right to sue them for infringement. DTV brought out their DirecTivo years later with bare bones features that were hardly comparable with the retail Tivo second generation dvrs They hardly advertised it and it went almost nowhere.Comcast was supposed to deploy Tivo’s sofware to it’s millions of customers, but they only did a “pilot” program in a few areas and never expanded beyond that. They did at least let SELECT MARKETS get access to their VOD offerings (mine included), but that’s about it Tivo is not a friend to the big cable and satellite companies, They are a company that they pretty much HAD to compromise with because they couldn’t rip off their intellectual property.