DirecTV Purchase of Replay May Strain Relations with TiVo

Filed in archive Business Trends on December 17, 2007

DirecTV recently purchased ReplayTV according to a recent article on The Hollywood Reporter. ReplayTV, along with TiVo, invented the DVR but was nearly sued out of existence. In the early '90's ReplayTV battled against TiVo for the dominant DVR position in the market place but lost.

The purchase of ReplayTV puts DirecTV in a position to expand upon ReplayTV's DVR technology. Currently DirecTV has an agreement with TiVo that prevents them from being sued by TiVo up until 2010. This recent purchase may give DirecTV just enough time to develop a DVR technology that doesn't violate TiVo patent rights.