Mark Ellison of Patton Boggs LLP asks a very interesting question as to whether the future of broadband video is at stake in a post on the Law360 blog. He asks this question in the context of the Comcast-NBC merger and he points out that securing content for its broadband properties is, in the opinion of many analysts, a motivation for the acquisition. Ellison poses many interesting questions as to what this powerful combination of broadband and content could mean in for competition. Click here to find his article (must be a Law360 subscriber).
Thanks to Ellison for sending the Viodi View a link to the Comcast/GE economic study of the merger (this was a recent submission to the FCC) and its impact on the online video marketplace. A key assumption in this study is that online video is a complement to Comcast’s traditional form of video distribution. Regardless, it suggests that even if there is a shift and the online video services become a competitor, Comcast will still win by offering a robust broadband offering. It also suggests that the overall company would lose more by restricting access to online programming than it would gain, since it only covers 23.8% of the households.
The second section of this study is a good tutorial on how the video distribution business works and is a recommended read. The last section gets into the nitty gritty of the economic analysis and features some good nuggets; some of which I am still pondering.
[Note, Ken Pyle is also Director of Broadband Affiliate Relations for ZillionTV, an online provider of video].
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