OpenTV Ad Technology Plays into TWC Consolidation

In 2008, Time Warner Cable restructured its company into six regional operating centers (ROCs). Now, it appears the company has further consolidated into four ROCs in the continental United States and one ROC in Hawaii. (For a look last summer at TWC’s Carolina region, click here.)

Last week, OpenTV announced that Time Warner Cable had installed its EclipsePlus advertising campaign management product in all four of its continental U.S. ROCs. The OpenTV announcement stated that the four ROCs represent more than 12.3 million subscribers, or 97 percent of the operator’s total subscriber base.

The process of deploying EclipsePlus at TWC has been going on since the beginning of 2009, said Paul Woidke, SVP and general manager of advanced advertising at OpenTV, adding that the midwest ROC just came online with the product this past weekend.

"Our initial deployments of EclipsePlus have been very successful," said Joan Gillman, EVP, Time Warner Cable and president of TWC Media Sales, in a prepared statement.

Considering that EclipsePlus is only one year old, it has been popular with MSOs. (For the original product announcement, click here.) Woidke said the product is deployed at Comcast Spotlight, Charter Communications, Cablevision, and that Suddenlink "is coming on board."

As the cable industry plows ahead with its advanced advertising efforts, it’s becoming clear that streamlining and simplifying cable ad buying is important for advertisers. (For more, click here.)

"The advertising process in a cable ROC is much more complicated than a (broadcast) TV station," said Woidke. "A TV station is one channel with one signal. In a market like Comcast in San Francisco, they’re running the equivalent of 50 different TV stations."

In addition to multi-channels, cable advertising is complicated with local spot buys, which is what EclipsePlus manages with a single database.

"We don’t have to have a different database for each DMA (designated market area). With one instance, you can handle as many DMAs as you want to roll into it – as many as 5,000 channels," Woidke said.

Although EclipsePlus will support VOD and interactive ads in the future, those features are not activated at this time. "We have not installed with any of our customers to do campaign management for VOD or addressable ads," said Woidke. "Right now, EclipsePlus handles dynamic scheduling of advertising, (has) advanced copy functions and scales to a large number of channels."

– Linda Hardesty

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