Comcast Exploring New Customer Retention Strategies

While not exactly abandoning its traditional video business, Comcast is more actively pursuing non-traditional IP-based services such as iPad-driven TV guide functions and Internet-based TV Everywhere as its primary future growth drivers.

“We’re proponents of TV Everywhere (and) we just recently launched with Turner (Networks),” Comcast Cable President Neil Smit said during a lunchtime question-and-answer session the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference in New York City. Comcast is also authenticating HBO’s TV Everywhere product, HBO Go, and determining how and whether to deal with third-party authentication in light of content protection concerns.

The recently launched iPad application leverages Comcast’s ...