DVR pioneer TiVo hopes to make a return to hardware with a stick device-- something similar to the Amazon Fire Stick running on Android TV together with upcoming services from the company.
As CEO Dave Shull tells CNN, the attempted comeback follows the recent splitting of the company, with one unit taking care of products and the other of IP licensing. The stick will be the opposite of the high-end DVRs that previously made TiVo's bread and butter, being a simple device one sticks to the back of their TVs. As such it bears a low pricetag, specifically of $50.
The TiVO Stick runs on Android TV and includes TiVo Plus-- a service designed to better integrate all the streaming services the user is subscribed to. Also available for existing TiVo customers, TiVo Plus covers Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, YouTube, content provider Xumo, entertainment company Jukin Media and newspaper publisher Gannett (with more to follow later), and uses AI to provide users with recommendations.
Will the TiVo Stick and TiVo Plus bring the company back to the glory days of the early 2000s? Shull hopes sales of the dongle will double the TiVo customer base to 50 million households by end 2020, but we will learn the actual numbers once it launches on October 2020.
