DirecTV Exec: Expect More DVRs, HD and Sales Efforts

[Gregg Lengling]

DirecTV Vice Chairman Eddy Hartenstein told the crowd attending Tuesday's Merrill Lynch Media Entertainment Conference in California that the company plans to focus on enhancing its basic service, expand DVR and high-def services, improve sales, marketing and distribution efforts, and improve customer service.

Some items that will be seen in the coming months:

*A new DirecTV set-top box is shipping, and it contains a new, enhanced interactive program guide. The set-top will become the standard for other new systems, Hartenstein said.

*New interactive TV services will debut in the next few months. They include "Mosaics," which will offer interactive sports and news, among other features, and "DirecTV Active," which will become an iTV portal for items such as weather information, advertising and other features.

In mid-2005, DirecTV will begin enhancing its DVR service, including the delivery of DVR-specific content. And in fall 2005, the satellite TV company will offer more enhanced features for NFL Sunday Ticket.

As for high-def, Hartenstein reiterated DirecTV's plans to deliver local high-def through new satellite capacity that will begin launching next year. As many as 500 local HD channels will be available in 2005, he said, and DirecTV hopes to have high-def available to "virtually every home in America by 2007," he added.

[kjnorman]

Having just come back from a vacation in the UK to see my family and having spent some time playing with my Dad's SkyTV digital set top box, I can honestly say that I am not keen on the interactive services.

On a lot of programs a red button will pop up in the top right corner of the screen with a caption (typically "press for more info") and it will sit there and not go away.  If you press the button on the remote it will shrink the screen and take you into interactive content.   That is all fine, but the problem I had is that when you are watching a program it covers some of the program.  Most annoying.

I asked my dad if it could be turned off, and he said it could not be.  I though this was odd, but I played with the system to try to hide the button and I could not find a solution.

So, SkyTV is owned by the Murdocks that also own DirecTV, and their new set top box is based on technology in the UK boxes, so this new tech may not have a silver lining.

Kerry

[gparris]

So you think Murdoch's Red dots and other aggravating interactive fare will eventually come to Directv?
:confused:

Even Tivo has a little thumb up and down, but the thing goes away after a few seconds (for you to ask Tivo to record or not).
He can keep that, but if he thinks this side of the Atlantic will like what they have in the UK, he mistaken...thanks for the information, Kerry!

Polls were taken at one time, I think more recently as to what we here in the USA wanted for cable and sat features to be added and interactive got a lukewarm response...take another, poll, Mr Murdoch!:D

[borghe]

more than likely (as has been speculated at least) Tivo ain't going nowhere. Unfortunately, NDS' box WILL still come over here. Tivo will be the "deluxe" box, NDS will be the free box.

The NDS box also runs on Linux on the MIPS architecture meaning a Tivo "upgrade" (for a small fee) is also still possible.