Sling Media, one of the pioneers in place shifting business, and maker of Sling Box, has been gathering good reviews and traction with the early adopter crowd. Why, it even has promised a Mac client, for those of us who belong to the Cult of Jobs. Matt Marshall, over at Silicon Beat reports that the San Mateo, California-based company has closed a big round of funding. So I spent sometime trying to dig-up additional details. I have heard the same rumors, from quite reliable sources, but got some additional details. For starters, it is not a big round of funding; instead its a monster round of funding.
Sling has so far raised about $15 million or so from the likes of Mobius and Doll Capital. The New Backers, whose names I am still trying to pin down are not your usual Sand-Hill Road players. Instead the big money is coming from big boys of telecom, media and entertainment business. Their investment in Sling could cause a bit of tremor in the old media landscape. Stay tuned for further details.
Additional Reading: Business 2.0: Home Entertainment To Go
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12:58 PM PT
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4 comments so far
4:03 AM PT
So when is the Mac client coming?
5:16 AM PT
How does slingbox not end up in a monster lawsuit?
Let me give you just one example:
Premium cable sports packages (Center Ice, League Pass, et al) in their TOS frequently use geographic black outs. This is largely to protect the distribution rights of the local cable sports network (who supply the actual programming). This enables bypassing those terms of service.
I would also imagine it violates the TOS of your basic cable or satellite contract.
2:34 PM PT
Doesn’t Sling become obsolete when IP-based fixed-mobile convergence gets any traction? Of course that’s a ways (couple years) away, but Sling probably goes the way of TiVO when that actually takes off, right? Or am I way off? Would love to hear your thoughts.
8:06 PM PT
Hmmm … Is there a Microsoft slingbox killer in the works?
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