FOR THE RECORD

Sezmi Brings Broadcast-Plus-VOD
TV Service to 36 U.S. Markets


BELMONT, CALIF. — Silicon Valley startup Sezmi is
doubling down on its bet that a significant number
of consumers can live without linear cable
networks — and just want video-on-demand
content.

Last week, the venture-backed company expanded
its entry-level service, Sezmi Select, to
36 U.S. markets. Those include Atlanta; Dallas-Ft.
Worth; Houston; Jacksonville, Fla.; Milwaukee;
Minneapolis-St. Paul; Philadelphia; Phoenix, Ariz.;
Salt Lake City, Utah; San Diego; Seattle-Tacoma;
and St. Louis. A full list of the Sezmi Select markets
is available at Sezmi.com.

For $4.99 per month, the service offers access
to broadcast channels, DVR features, and some
VOD and Internet video content. The service also
requires consumers to pay $150 for the Sezmi
antenna and 1-Terabyte DVR; the hardware previously
was $299.
Sezmi is “geared toward
people who are tired of paying
the high price of cable and
satellite,” the company said. It noted
that cable companies typically charge more
than $5 per month just for DVR service.

For now, Sezmi offers the premium Select Plus
service — with 23 linear cable networks — only
in Los Angeles, its first commercial market, where
it launched in February. Eventually, the company
said, it expects to roll out Select Plus in all markets
but has not announced a timeframe.

Sezmi’s system delivers TV programming and
VOD using a combination of Internet bandwidth
and multicast spectrum leased from local broadcasters.
Customers must separately sign up for
broadband service.

BigBand Q2 Sales Drop,
Vendor Swings to Net Loss

REDWOOD CITY, CALIF. — BigBand Networks, a supplier
of switched digital and IP video equipment,
posted a 32% drop in revenue and swung to a
net loss of $9.6 million for the second quarter.

The company reported sales of $26.4 million
for the three months ended June 30, versus $39
million in the year-ago period. Net loss for the
second quarter was $9.6 million, or $0.14 per
share, compared with net income of $3.1 million
in the second quarter of 2009.

Most of BigBand’s revenue in the recent
quarter came from two customers: Time Warner
Cable, which represented 36% of revenue; and
Verizon Communications, at 22%. Other customers
include Cox Communications, Charter Communications
and Cablevision Systems.

BigBand president and CEO Amir Bassan-
Eskenazi, on a call with analysts, said the company
experienced a slowdown in revenue on
SDV and QAM as “some customers are preparing
for capacity expansion, and others are taking a
breather on deploying new systems.”

“We believe this is a temporary situation but it
impacts our third-quarter outlook,” he said, noting
that BigBand’s switched digital video now
passed more than 37 million households.

For the third quarter of 2010, BigBand said it
expects revenue to be $24 million to $27 million,
with a net loss per share of $0.11 to $0.14.

VOD Outlet Concert TV Sold to Canadian
Music Programmer Stingray Digital

NEW YORK — Interactivation has sold its video-ondemand
service Concert TV to Stingray Digital,
a Montreal firm whose existing music channels
include VOD offering The Karaoke Channel. The
new owner plans to continue distributing Concert
TV on VOD in this country and will offer it to
cable, satellite and IPTV distributors in Canada.

Terms were not disclosed.

While Interactivation increased distribution for
Concert TV to more than 30 million homes, the
live-music service’s model is based on advertising
(not subscription revenue) and faced tough
genre rivals in the likes of MTV Networks’ HD
channel, Palladia.

Stingray Digital properties include The Karaoke
Channel, the world’s largest licensed karaoke
library and karaoke service on TV and the Internet,
available in 80 million homes, and Galaxie, a
45-channel linear digital music network, the leading
digital music service on TV in Canada. It was
founded by new media entrepreneurs Eric Boyko
and Alexandre Taillefer and is financially backed
by Telesystem and Novacap.

ESPN Agrees to Sell BASS
To Logan, Other Investors


ORLANDO, FLA. — Continuing its retreat from the
outdoor genre, ESPN has reached an agreement
in principle to sell BASS, LLC, to a group of investors
led by Jerry McKinnis, Jim Copeland and
Don Logan, the former chairman of the Media
and Communications Group at then-AOL Time
Warner.

BASS is the largest membership organization
of bass anglers in the U.S. with more than
500,000 members. Bought by ESPN in 2001, it
includes several media platforms, including three
magazines and a Web site. The purchasing party
will assume ownership of all BASS assets after the
completion of the sale, terms of which were not
disclosed.

As part of the agreement in principle, BASS’s
core TV assets — the Bassmaster Elite Series and
Bassmaster Classic — will continue to air on ESPN
networks.

Come 2011, those shows will represent the
only category fare remaining on the sports
giant’s air, as ESPN is replacing its hunting/fishing
weekend morning block with live news and
event programming.

When ESPN bought BASS, it envisioned it and
other assets such as the ESPN Outdoor Games
forming the centerpiece of an ESPN Outdoors
network that never came to be.