Motorola Mobility’s countersuit against TiVo that seeks to have...

sued Motorola Mobility for allegedly infringing three patents, including one that describes a method for recording one program while watching another, the trial will be based on Motorola’s lawsuit seeking to negate the claims by having them declared invalid. TiVo hasn’t said how much it’s seeking in damages for patent infringement. But analysts have pegged it at more than $1 billion, and TiVo General Counsel Matthew Zinn has maintained that Motorola’s alleged infringement “took away an awful lot of business” from the DVR developer. TiVo forecast a $13 million-16 million net loss for Q2, largely due to the $9 million-$11 million it expects to spend on the Motorola trial and other litigation, including a separate case pending against Cisco, said TiVo Chief Financial Officer Naveen Chopra. “I think we have a very clear case” against Motorola and Time Warner Cable, which also is party to the case, Rogers said. The case has “significant damages attached to it,” he said. A potential injunction that would bar infringing products is “a very important part of the case,” Rogers said. TiVo gained a ruling recently from U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap in Marshall blocking Cisco from filing further counterclaims against TiVo and eliminating the possibility that the case would be tried in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., said David Miller, an analyst with Caris & Co. TiVo has reached settlements of patent infringement suits with AT&T, Dish Network and Verizon, which owe $125 million, $170 million and $150 million under the separate agreements, TiVo officials said. Dish’s payments are made annually, while Verizon’s are quarterly, TiVo officials said. Meanwhile, TiVo signed on Atlantic Broadband to start offering its DVR to 250,000 subscribers across seven states, while Mediacom is expected to begin deployments in June and will be followed by Cable One, Rogers said. Scandinavian cable operator Com Hem has begun taking pre-orders for its IPTV system that will offer TiVo both as a DVR and as a cloud-based product, Rogers said. TiVo added 255,000 cable system subscribers in Q1, led by Virgin Media with 177,000, followed by Ono in Spain and Suddenlink. Virgin has 1.5 million customers with the TiVo service, while Ono has 166,000 and Suddenlink, 80,000, Rogers said. Nearly half of TiVo’s new hardware sales in Q1 were for its four-tuner DVR, which typically has a positive profit margin, Rogers said. TiVo typically doesn’t seek to drive “significant margin” off hardware sales at retail or through cable operators, but sales of higher-end products are “profitable to us,” Rogers said. During the past four years, TiVo’s cable and satellite system operator profit margins have been 5-25 percent, said Rob Sanderson, an analyst at MKM Partners. TiVo also reached agreement with Nielsen to provide its data as part of the DVR company’s research and analytics business. TiVo also has combined its Power Watch rating service with the buying behavior data it gained in buying TRA Inc. last year for $20 million, Rogers said. TiVo’s Q1 net loss narrowed to $10.3 million from $20.7 million a year earlier as revenue rose to $82.5 million from $67.7 million. Services revenue jumped to $34 million from $30.6 million, while that from technology increased to $27.7 million from $23.8 million. Hardware sales improved to $20.7 million from $13.2 million. Revenue from TiVo-owned subscribers slipped to $25.9 million from $26.5 million despite an increase in average revenue per user (ARPU) to $8.51 from $8.08. Cable and satellite system operator sales grew to $8 million from $4 million as ARPU rose to $1.19 from $1.06. TiVo added 255,000 cable and satellite customers in Q1, while its standalone service lost 22,000, the company said. It ended Q1 with a million standalone TiVo subscribers and 2.3 million with cable and satellite operators. Monthly churn declined in Q1 to 1.5 percent from 1.6 percent a year earlier.