Apple's streaming TV service could be powered by Comcast

Apple *is reportedly in talks with the largest cable provider in the US and discussions are said to be in very early stages.

Apple hasn’t publicly revealed as yet how it intends to expand and improve its TV offering. Last year it released a refreshed model of the Apple TV set-top box and since then various content sources have been added. A full-fledged TV set seems to be out of the question for now, so is Apple looking towards establishing a streaming TV service first before it takes that step?

That might very well be true. Citing people familiar with the matter, the Wall Street Journal reports that Apple is having discussions with Comcast about setting up a streaming service TV that would use an Apple TV. Apple is reportedly looking for assurances that its service won’t face congestion on the web, and that its traffic will be separated from public internet traffic so as to maintain a certain level of quality and user experience.*If a deal is struck, Apple TV users would then be able to stream live TV shows as well as on-demand content provided by the nation’s largest cable provider.

The deal is still far from being finalized. As previously mentioned, talks are believed to be at a very early stage at this point in time. Quite a few hurdles will have to be cleared before such a service can be launched. Comcast would probably also have to make some infrastructure upgrades to ensure that the quality of the service meets Apple’s requirements.

On the other hand, Barclays Capital analyst Kannan Venkateshwar believes that if a deal is struck, it would just be a simple arrangement which would put a Comcast channel on the Apple TV, similar to the Hulu and Netflix channels that are already available for the set-top box. Venkateshwar is of the view that Apple TV doesn’t provide cable providers with enough incentive to strike an aggressive deal, that would include offering a free flowing path for the traffic.

Both Apple and Comcast declined to comment when contacted by the scribe. A few months back it was rumored that Apple was discussing a similar deal with Time Warner Cable,*its possible that those plans might have hit a wall as Comcast announced in February its intention to acquire Time Warner.

Source: Wall Street Journal

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