TiVo wants $1 BILLION out of DISH/EchoStar

Normally, when perusing the various legal briefs and news coverage out of the epic and ongoing TiVo v DISH/EchoStar DVR patent dispute, my eyes glaze over (see: Boredom in the Courtroom). Today’s a bit different. A ZNF reader who’s been tracking this case, and who I presume to be a shareholder, forwarded DISH’s latest filing (7/13, PACER). The document in and of itself isn’t so interesting to the casual observer. However, it does reveal some astonishing content from within TiVo’s recent sealed motion (6/27) of sanctions for contempt of the permanent injunction:

TiVo’s response on the issue of judicial economy is that the sanctions hearing set for later this month will be short because each side was allowed only 30 minutes for argument. This simplistic retort ignores the substantial work for this Court — reviewing briefing, case law, and complicated financial evidence — that will be required for consideration of TiVo’s motion, which seeks nearly $1 billion in contempt sanctions.

There’s really not much to say other than: That’s a sh*tload of money. (While I’m having NTP flashbacks, TiVo actually has a product, business partners, and customers.) One thing’s for sure, if TiVo expects to see this kind of cash award, they’re going to need to buy a few more cows.

Click screencaps to enlarge:

10 thoughts on “TiVo wants $1 BILLION out of DISH/EchoStar”

  1. ZNF as hard boiled investigative journalism, ala PBS’s Frontline…Love it!

    Wish I had the dialog from All the President’s Men memorized for a more pithy comment!

  2. Well, we still gotta keep it blog-real. You won’t find a Dr. Evil image popup or “sh*tload” in the mainstream media, who’ll provide their own late, boring coverage tomorrow. ;) And I’ve been waiting for a post where I could reference that attempted steer bribery.

  3. I’m sure a Tivo executive leaned back in his chair and uttered the following question,

    “If Echostar had paid us our original settlement and we had put that to good use developing new technology or marketing at the right time or acquiring another company, what is the most we could have realized from any or all of those activities?”

    “$1 billion sir”

    “Put that down”

  4. Tivo should ask for some money and ownership of Slingbox from Dish.

    Then Tivo should build Slingboxes right into their DVRs.

  5. My back of the envelope calculation of additional damages was $750M. I am not surprised that TIVO is seeking $1B. None of this includes the licensing fees that DISH will have to pay going forward.

    I am just shocked that DISH continues to dig itself a deeper and deeper hole. Settle already. =)

  6. I estimated that TiVo could get upwards of $500 billion, so this isn’t surprising. Basically, they’ve been in contempt (again) since April 2008. That’s 16 months, which would be about $150 million using the previous settlements as guidance. But then throw in treble damages, and that rises to $450 million. Add in the previous awards of over $200 million, and you get a number that’s somewhere around $650 million. So $1 billion isn’t terribly surprising.

  7. @Jake:
    I assume you were estimating upwards of $500M, not $500B. Or you were grossly overestimating…

Comments are closed.