TV2 Hotcopper Holders Calculations, page-698

Thanks Birdchirp for your research,
I had several booths at Broadcast Asia show me the latest generation Set Top Boxes(STB) including the Apple one you mention with Divan. Everyone predicted the demise of STB's a few years ago but they still hang in there for various reasons with the established players and cheap Chinese knock-offs still evident at the Show.

One of the consistent feedback conversations is how the hardware manufacturers you mention are all trying to charge levies to OTT delivery service providers, or Smart TV app providers to move away from just flogging product to earning revenue from the software or content side of the business.

Its a sliced and diced cost-side equation now for anyone setting up an end-to-end ecosystem for content delivery and pricing models can get burnt if they are not mindful of the incremental cost that slowly adds up as a single event stream navigates its way through hardware encoding, then internet ISPs and then onto the various end user viewing devices, plus the costs for content and the support costs of call centres and complaint or error diagnosis.

A number of companies did not build pricing models that evolved with the changing pricing dynamics of the various players and their bit in that delivery chain. They went out of business or repriced with resistance from users who churned away to competitors or pirate offerings.

The STB can offer an App a home that negates placing it inside the Smart TV environment and depending on the nature of what is being done, avoid royalty fees to the linear TV maker. I think Divan have evolved with a strategy that adapted to the changing face of the industry. I did not see Divan specifically at the Show however.

TV2U has to get its pricing and cost-supply model exact as paper thin margins can end up resulting if they overlook any significant cost in the service delivery and support, and where their pricing comes under pressure to be set commercially to match competing supplier offerings.