[MJ-bos]

Yeow........................................


EchoStar Agrees to Acquire Sling Media
Associated Press
September 25, 2007 12:23 a.m.

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. -- Satellite television provider EchoStar Communications Corp. has agreed to acquire Sling Media Inc. in a cash and options deal that values the provider of Slingbox at $380 million.

The transaction was expected to close by the end of the year, Englewood-based EchoStar said late Monday.

Sling Media, based in Foster City, Calif., allows users to watch their home TV signals over the Internet.

"As an early investor in Sling Media, EchoStar has been pleased with the progress and commitment the company has made establishing Sling Media and the Slingbox as powerful and beloved digital media brands," EchoStar CEO Charlie Ergen said in a written statement.

Sling Media CEO Blake Krikorian said the deal would help Sling Media expand.

"We are psyched to make this announcement," Krikorian said. "We have worked closely with EchoStar for more than two years, and have come to realize that both companies have similar entrepreneurial cultures and mutual dedication and passion for creating empowering experiences that benefit the consumer and the media industry."

Copyright © 2007 Associated Press

 

[ZeoTiVo]

I would think this a prank notice if it was not true

http://www.zatznotfunny.com/2007-09/echostar-announces-agreement-to-acquire-sling-media-inc/

not sure where Echosatr is headed with this though Sling is a great product and company

 

[Curtis]

What does this have to do with TiVo?

 

[kmill14]

What does this have to do with TiVo?

Directly? Not at all. Indirectly, the cable and SAT companies are doing everything they can to differentiate themselves from each other.

Comcast is already getting in bed with Tivo with some butchered Tivo software. How long until the cables realize the potential they have with totally going to bed with Tivo and its full range of features?

Stop pissing around with this USB dongle and get the solution out there. Stop with your own crappy boxes and fully support Tivo and everything it has to offer.

 

[d_anders]

In the overall long term scheme of content distribution, the slingmedia technology and patents gives EchoStar another avenue to potentially deliver content in the long term.

In the end, I believe that this was a pure strategic play and reading what they're major competitor (besides cable) may do.

It's a strange turn of events, but in the end where do you think DirecTV may consider doing after the ownership finally changes over to Liberty Media, who already owns a percentage of TiVO? Certainly one path is to buy TiVo and lock in TiVo's UI and technology for DirecTV...another lock in for SAT vs Cable. How long do you think Comcast will want to stay with TiVo being that they may be owned by DirecTV?

Given this move, it will be interesting to see how strategic either Comcast (or a combination of players) believe it will be to lock in TiVo...or allow DirecTV to lock them in.

In the end, TiVo technology may ultimately be a pure cable based tech, or a Sat based tech.

The next 6 months will prove to be more than interesting....

 

[old64mb]

It's not actually a surprise that they sold out at this point; their SG&A budget the last few months has to have been massive (all the Slingbox ads) and as their CEO points out they were going to have to do a third round of financing.

It's more a strategic move for E* than anything that dramatically affects Slingbox or Tivo; most noticable effect is what would have been 3rd generation Slingbox technology will more than likely be seen on integrated E* boxes rather than separate stuff for a while. The satellite companies have never exactly been brilliant with CapEx.

If Tivo had the balance sheet they should have done this deal themselves, but trying to raise equity in this market to buy something that would have been cash burning would have gotten them rightfully shot even if down the road a few years the combination of technologies would have been fascinating.