TiVo Goes to New Zealand

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There is apparently no area too remote for the coolness of TiVo (Nasdaq: TIVO).

Come November, Telecom New Zealand (NYSE: NZT) will be offering TiVo DVR bundles to its broadband customers in an exclusive deal.

It's important to put this deal in its proper perspective. On one hand, the lush island nation has a population of roughly 4.3 million. That's a small number, even if TiVo's subscriber base is a mere 3.1 million.

However, this will also create incremental growth for a company that can certainly use it. There were 3.6 million TiVo subscribers a year ago.

The push into New Zealand isn't unexpected. TiVo made a splash in Australia a year ago, and New Zealand's largest television broadcaster took an equity stake in the Australian network's subsidiary. The move would be "paving the way for the promotion and distribution of TiVo in New Zealand by the end of 2009," the company noted during last month's quarterly conference call.

This doesn't mean TiVo's stateside growth has been exhausted. Its perpetual legal victories against DISH Network (Nasdaq: DISH) -- and new lawsuits against Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and AT&T (NYSE: T) -- bode well for the company's ability to flex its muscular patents as the pioneer of digital video recording.

It remains to be seen whether TiVo's future will be as the physical centerpiece of home theater systems or whether it will just passively collect juicy royalties as others pay to use the company's intellectual properties.

For now, at least, there's one more stamp for its passport.