Cable User Interface Improvements Seen Better Integrating Apps, Devices, Video

Cited by interviews as new user interface examples among the biggest operators are what Comcast calls “next-generation” initiatives including X1 and X2 for customers to search from among many types of content (http://xfin.tv/196Xn4u), Time Warner Cable efforts that include the ability to restart shows without setting a DVR (http://bit.ly/Hoi3uN) and Cox Communications’ Contour, which includes a whole-home DVR (http://bit.ly/1chLDfm). A goal of user interface improvements is to give subscribers easy-to-use ways to find content they want, without necessarily differentiating from linear video, VOD and online content, and see programming on devices that don’t all need a set-top box, said survey participants. Those surveyed said such efforts often also include the ongoing migration of functions from set-tops and other consumer devices to the cloud of the Internet and/or operators’ headends and networks. What the industry is doing to move to the cloud will be the subject of a story next month in Communications Daily.

Larger cable operators are generally migrating user interface functions to the cloud, some Cisco’s assistance, said Steve Tranter, director-sales operations at the CE company. That includes moving from program guides based on set-tops and “merging” search with the “whole array of content,” so “the viewer doesn’t have any hard work to do, and it’s personalized to them, it knows the content they already like” and can make recommendations, he said. Customers don’t “necessarily know” where the content comes from, just that “it’s live to you,” said Tranter. Carriage agreements are the only issue holding up this migration, since not all deals allow viewing beyond linear and VOD to over-the-top apps that work with user interfaces to let cable customers more easily locate content, he said. Subscribers often can see such over-the-top content only inside a household, he noted.

The changes come amid forecasts of continuing video customer losses in the cable industry, as consumers increasingly think of operators as Internet companies because they often buy Web access through them, said analysts who replied to our survey. U.S. basic subscribers have been declining for the past five or six years in the cable industry, having peaked in 2002 at about 66 million and falling 16 percent to 55.5 million as of June 30, said SNL Kagan’s Tony Lenoir. That total may fall a further 14 percent to 48 million by 2023, he said. “We don’t think the decline will be as pronounced as it has been in the last four or five years. But we expect further erosion.”

Improving user inputs and displays is part of tech enhancements that operators are undertaking to move content from primarily TV sets to smartphones, tablets and computers, said executives at the cable industry’s R&D consortium. A goal is for a wide range of devices to be able to understand users’ speech commands and visual gestures and react to them, said some at CableLabs. “We're really developing a platform that will allow the industry to innovate on all these fronts,” said Senior Vice President-Video Services and Technology R&D Ed Miller. CableLabs has been stepping up work on Web technology and home networking through such standards bodies as the Digital Living Network Alliance that go beyond the “core-to-the-cable-world” organizations such as the Internet Engineering Task Force and Moving Picture Experts Group, he said. “We're positioning ourselves for a constant evolution of underlying technology."

Set-top Functions Sans Box

Giving customers all the functionality of a set-top box through various user interfaces on a variety of devices is another goal of the tech work among operators and standards bodies, said executives. Using remote user interface HTML5 technology can “provide a customer experience” akin to what a cable operator provides via a set-top, said CableLabs Director-IP Video Technologies Jon Courtney. Once such functionality is achieved, “we don’t really need the set-top box anymore” and can use a smart TV, HDMI stick and other alternatives, he said. “The set-top box really becomes obsolete at that point.”

Operators and vendors “don’t want to be restricted necessarily by older set-top boxes” as video subscribers are watching more content that’s not live and is on demand, said Tranter. Cisco’s Snowflake platform works across set-tops, tablets and other devices for pay-TV companies to compete with the user interfaces seen on stand-alone CE devices, he said. Consumers’ tablets can be used to “essentially offload” some of the user interface functions from the TV set, said David Grubb, chief technology officer-strategy of Arris, which bought from Google what was once Motorola Mobility’s set-top box business. Arris enables operators to offer ways to search for content across platforms, he said.

The so-called second screen and applications for them are being looked at by “virtually every operator,” said Grubb. Devices such as tablets that act as second screens are much less static than TV sets because of their touch and swipe functionality, he and others said. “That tablet could be a better way to browse and discover new content that you're ultimately going to consume on the main screen” of the TV set, said Grubb. “From a consumer perspective, you can create a more engaging and kind of easy-to-flow-through experience on a tablet, where you can touch and interact with” a user interface, he said. “It’s about getting them to the content quickly,” he said of consumers. The better the user interface, “the less time they'll spend using it, because it means they got to the content more quickly,” added Grubb.

Creating modern user interface designs lets operators compete with the ease-of-use and intuitiveness of products from companies including Apple and Roku, said Tranter and other executives. Time Warner Cable is among the operators taking that approach, said Senior Vice President Gregg Fujimoto. “We've been going much beyond just the traditional cable box,” including by letting customers use the company as a Wi-Fi hotspot provider of sorts to get content in various places, he said. “Consumers have told us it’s a new way for them to look at cable companies."

Post-Recession, Beyond Remotes

Modern design of cable user interfaces takes them far beyond remote controls linked to TVs, with some UIs resembling a Web page in terms of breadth of choices and layout, said some respondents to our survey. They said that’s propelling tech innovation in the cable industry, and with it, easier ways than traditional remotes and on-screen programming guides to find content. “There really is a generational leap in terms of user interface ease of use and capabilities that is happening as we speak,” said CableLabs’ Courtney. “The idea is to provide the best experience for consumers on their choice of devices where they want to view the content,” said Courtney’s boss at the consortium, Miller. “It’s not just on the main TV in one location in the home."

Cable operators no longer depend on what a set-top can do when it comes to offering services, said executives interviewed for this story and in other appearances this year where they said the industry has tech prowess. “All these years you had a cable box in your house, and the innovation is dependent on what the cable box could do,” said Comcast CEO Brian Roberts on C-SPAN in June. The “last 18 months, we've sort of had an ‘aha’ moment, which is when the technology allowed us to move most of the brains of the box, like everything else in our society, to the cloud,” he said on the channel’s Communicators program (CD June 17 p11) from the Cable Show’s exhibit floor (http://cs.pn/1gac4Z2). “Our whole company culture has evolved to really trying to be” about “technology innovation” and “new products,” he said. “There’s a buzz in the company and a vibe that I'm really proud of.” Comcast had no comment for this story.

The ability to use apps to find favorite content, watch it on devices of their choosing and in some cases view it outside their household is a draw for some subscribers, said survey respondents. Time Warner Cable’s marketing has emphasized apps, sometimes promoting the company along with apps to see particular shows, said Fujimoto. “What everybody is working towards is giving users the full experience with the TV, or beyond the TV.” Consumers aren’t so much put off by set-top boxes as coming to understand “now that there are different ways to access the media,” said Fujimoto. “Nobody is coming over and denigrating the set-top box.” He described an excitement about TV apps and deals to integrate the cable operator’s functions with smart sets, the use of which does “bypass the traditional set-top box."

The recession and with it a decline in the number of video subscribers “kind of forced” operators to better respond to consumers, some of whom were cutting service entirely or cutting back, said Consumer Reports cable and telecom analyst Jeff Blyskal in an interview. “The economy and the market realities forced them to be more responsive to consumers.” But many operators don’t appear to be “consumer friendly,” as prices have continued to rise and many subscribers feel they're charged for such things as equipment or access to sports programming that should be included in the base price, said Blyskal. He said he now thinks of Comcast, his ISP in El Cerito, Calif., as an Internet distributor.

The ability to see content across devices is a way to keep cable customers, said some survey respondents. The “stickiness factor is that insight that consumers are passionate about their devices” and the content they see on it, said Fujimoto. The merging of pay-TV and other content to cable subscribers is also promoted by the company’s partnership with former sister company Time Warner Inc. around the latter firm’s HBO Game of Thrones, said Fujimoto. “Those will become big areas to emphasize to the consumer” as more deals happen for such cable content to be widely available wherever cable customers go, he said.

Pointing customers to what they can get from an operator is more effective than showing them the technology involved per se, said Fujimoto. “It’s that fine line with the consumer” that expects all operators to have “gotten so far advanced,” he said. “A lot of it is just us reminding them” of existing features like the ability to watch shows without using a DVR after they've originally appeared on TV, he said. “From a consumer marketing point of view, we're kind of calling it a demonstration strategy. If we can demonstrate where we are right today,” that sends a strong marketing message, he said. “The irony is we are a massive technology company just because we are able to deliver the high-speed bandwidth,” continued Fujimoto. “We don’t really have a need to position ourselves that way.”