Signaling a major expansion to its relationship with the biggest U.S. pay-TV operator, Elemental Technologies says its video processing software is now being used to power Comcast's (NASDAQ: CMCSA) X1 in-home streaming and cloud-based DVR services.
Comcast has launched in-home streaming and cloud DVR features for X1 in markets including Philadelphia, Boston, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Houston, Atlanta and Elemental's home base of Portland, Ore., among other regions.
The cloud DVR feature lets Comcast customers stream recorded shows to their mobile devices wherever they can get a connection. Elemental's transcoding technology has been in use by Comcast's VOD services for some time already.
"Elemental is going from just powering the on-demand piece publicly with Comcast to powering all of their live streaming for multi-screen devices in Portland as well as the X1 set-top box," Elemental CEO Sam Blackman told the Portland Business Journal. "So we are expanding the footprint of our services inside Comcast into a much broader array of services."
Elemental video software is designed to run on off-the-shelf hardware, allowing operators to distribute content without building highly specialized data centers. The use of the Elemental tech provides a rare glimpse into the X1 cloud infrastructure, which Comcast has been pretty tight-lipped about.
Elemental's client list also includes DirecTV (NASDAQ: DTV), ESPN and HBO.
For more:
- see this Elemental Technologies press release
- see this Portland Business Journal story
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