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Technology Stocks : C-Cube -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter V who wrote (48498)	1/27/2000 1:21:00 PM
From: DiViT	Respond to of 50808

Perhaps someone should forward that to Cube and see what they say...

To: Peter V who wrote (48498)	1/27/2000 8:20:00 PM
From: John Rieman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50808

I want one of those ATI Video Wonder cards. Interactive TV is coming................................... cableworld.com Dominos Fall for Interactive TV by Alan Breznick As the dust starts to settle, one thing is clear: America Online's proposed merger with Time Warner Inc. promises to boost the fortunes of Liberate Technologies and damage the prospects of Microsoft Corp. and PowerTV Inc. Liberate Technologies, now on a roll in the interactive TV market and backed partly by AOL is already supplying the critical "middleware" software and interactive applications for the forthcoming national rollout of AOL TV, slated to start this spring. With Time Warner now likely to offer AOL TV as its interactive TV service, that means Liberate's software will probably find its way into the MSO's digital cable set-tops. Time Warner Cable has already installed more than 400,000 digital boxes in its 13 million cable homes and plans to deploy them in at least 500,000 more boxes by the end of this year. "Obviously, that's good news for us," said Charlie Tritschler, VP-marketing for Liberate. "We have been talking to them (Time Warner) for a long time." The good news for Liberate will probably be bad news for Microsoft's WebTV Networks division and PowerTV, two other leading interactive TV software players angling for placement in Time Warner's digital set-tops. In particular, the AOL purchase of Time Warner doesn't bode well for PowerTV, a company backed by Scientific-Atlanta Inc. that now provides the operating system software, middleware layer and interactive applications for all of the MSO's digital boxes. "Sure, I'm concerned," said J. Bowmar Rodgers, COO of PowerTV, which has its flagship operating system software in more than 1 million digital set-tops overall. "We need to satisfy Time Warner and give them applications and services as quickly as possible." But Rodgers argued that the new AOL Time Warner Inc. may not necessarily jettison PowerTV from its digital cable boxes, especially because Liberate doesn't have operating system software to replace PowerTV's brand. With the AOL acquisition of Time Warner not expected to close until late next fall, the MSO said it's too early to say which interactive TV software it will use once the merger closes. A Time Warner Cable spokesman said the company is focusing instead on rolling out as many Scientific-Atlanta and Pioneer digital set-tops as possible in 2000. "It's way too premature to speculate on Liberate," the spokesman said. "We've got to work through all these issues." In the meantime, Liberate is racing ahead of its rivals in signing up cable operators, satellite TV providers, telephone companies and others for its interactive TV software. In its two latest coups, it snagged Canadian MSO Shaw Communications Inc. and telco equipment supplier Next Level Communications Inc. as customers. Shaw, one of five major cable operators that have invested in Liberate, said it will use Liberate's software in its digital boxes from General Instrument Corp. The Canadian MSO plans to offer interactive services to more than 300,000 of its 1.8 million cable subscribers, starting this summer. Next Level said it will integrate Liberate's software in its new TV/telephone/data set-tops, designed for use on high-speed phone lines equipped with digital subscriber line (DSL) technology. U S West is using the box, known as Residential Gateway 2000, for its interactive TV trial in Phoenix.