Cox has abandoned its launch of streaming video aggregation platform Flare MeTV just over two months after confirming plans to deploy the service across the majority of its footprint.
"Yes, we've decided not to launch MeTV as originally intended," Cox spokesman Todd Smith told FierceCable. Smith declined to provide a reason for the change of plans.
With Flare MeTV, Cox intended to provide a target audience of millennial-aged viewers a personalized dashboard of online video content, similar to what Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA) is developing for its X1 platform with Watchable.
In fact, Light Reading speculates that Cox's recent decision to license the X1 platform from Comcast might have some baring on the decision to scuttle Flare MeTV.
It is possible that the integration of Watchable is part of the X1 platform Cox is licensing, in much the same way Cox abandoned its own search and discovery technology in its version of X1, which it calls Contour.
Flare MeTV, Watchable and Verizon's (NYSE: VZ) mobile video platform Go90 represent operator attempts to aggregate online video to millennial target audiences.
Cox has experimented with a number of IP-based video platforms under the "Flare" brand. A service called flareWatch, based on Fanhattan's Fan TV technology (acquired by Rovi last year), launched and quickly failed in 2013. However, kid-targeted aggregation platform Flare Kids and video game-themed flarePlay are still around.
For more:
- read this Light Reading story
- read this Multichannel News story
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