Hewlett-Packard signs 30 suppliers for media-on-demand

By Ned Randolph -- Video Business, 10/4/2007

OCT. 4 | Hewlett-Packard waded deeper into the media-on-demand space today by announcing it has licensed the catalog of 30 content providers, adding 4,000 titles under its H-P Video Merchant Services brand.

Though invisible to the consumer, the partnerships mean that retailers such as Wal-Mart and others that deal with H-P will have access to titles—many of which would otherwise be out of circulation.

H-P can fulfill catalog orders by burning titles onto DVDs and shipping them overnight to customers, similar to Amazon’s CustomFlix service, or it can stream content for download through a retailer’s online Web store, like Walmart.com.

“We’re, in essence, a wholesaler,” said Doug Warner, VP of business development and planning for H-P Digital Services.

H-P currently runs the Web stores of Wal-Mart and TransWorld Entertainment, which also have their own titles under license.

Today’s announcement gives H-P its own access to titles to make available to any vendor.

It’s estimated that more than 70,000 titles have been licensed for DVD—only a fraction of which are ever circulated.

Several vendors and technology providers have been positioning themselves in the media-on-demand space. The limitation has been that they have had to license with each individual content provider for distribution rights.

And the major studios have been outright hesitant to open up their catalogs without assurances from providers of using an encryption service similar to their own.

Last week, the DVD Copy Control Assn. gave the go ahead to license the Content Scrambling System favored by studios, which theoretically could open studio vaults to vendors such as H-P that want access to their entire catalog for burning onto DVD.

However, none of the content providers announced today by H-P required CSS encryption, said Warner.

The content companies include Arts Alliance America, First Look Studios, Gaiam Americas, Nelvana Enterprises and Venevision International Films.

They’ll provide classic and older TV shows never before released on DVD; foreign movies; specialty genres such as religion, education, lifestyle, health, food and sports; specialty cable TV programming; independent movies; and recently broadcast TV shows and sporting events that have high relevancy in specific geographic markets or with specific consumer segments.

“We’ve done 4,000 titles in six months. Many of the 70,000 titles on DVD are targeted,” said Warner. “There are tens of thousands of titles still to do.”

In addition to the content companies above, H-P also has signed licensing agreements with Anthem Pictures, Azteca International Corp., Bennett Media Worldwide, Cinequest, Film Chest, Inspired Studios, Janson Media, Lightworks Program Distribution, Media Blasters, Monarch Films, Mukta Arts Limited, MVD Entertainment Group, Opper Sports, Santa Fe Productions, Seedsman Group, Smooth Motion Pictures, Starlight Home Entertainment, Tai Seng Entertainment, TLA Releasing, UTV Communications, V.I.E.W. Video, Vanguard Cinema, Wink Inc. Productions, Wolfe Video and World Events Products.