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When Ms Shah could see the 9 p.m. Gujarati TV news being broadcast in Ahmedabad on her son's laptop in the US, she was overjoyed. Place-shift technology allows you to do this – catch live television content anywhere in the world, on any device, via the Internet.
This is what Mr Bhupen Shah, Founder and CTO of Slingbox, did for his mother. He connected the TV set-top box, router and broadband connection at his mother's home in Ahmedabad to a ‘Slingbox Pro HD' device. He then downloaded the ‘SlingPlayer' software onto his laptop. So when the laptop is powered, the software connects to the SlingBox, which in turn receives signals from the set-top box and relays the content to the laptop, via broadband.
The technology not only allows you to catch live television on any device (tablet, laptop or PC), you can also switch channels and control volume, the company claims. Not just TV, you can connect the Slingbox to the DVR, Blu-Ray DVD player or video camera too.
“With a huge mobile and TV subscriber base, and a huge following for cricket and Bollywood, we see India as an attractive market for us. The video quality obviously depends on the bandwidth,” said Mr Raghu Tarra, Managing Director, Sling Media, at the launch of Slingbox in India.
Slingbox PRO-HD, which will be launched at the end of the month, comes at an ‘IPL special' price of Rs 14,999. A standard definition device has also been launched for the “price-sensitive” India market at Rs 7,999. They are available through Croma, Reliance Digital and Flipkart.com, in Bangalore, Mumbai, Hyderabad and NCR. Plans are onto expand to Chennai, Pune and Ahmedabad. Slingbox is sold in over 5,000 retail stores across 20 countries.
Does Sling Media fear copyright or broadcast violation issues with content providers or cable carriers, given that content is being transmitted on another device, other than the TV? “Having paid for television content, Slingbox allows consumers to watch it anywhere on any device. This is fair-play and so far we haven't faced any issues,” said Mr Jay Tannenbaum, Vice-President – Marketing.
Sling Media employs over 300 people globally; its Bangalore centre alone has 150 people. The company is owned by the $2.35-billion Colarado-headquartered EchoStar Corporation which provides set-top box equipment, digital broadcast operations and satellite services.
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