AT&T, Cisco invest in IPTV startup

AT&T and Cisco Systems led the latest round of investment in Akimbo Systems, a startup that delivers on-demand video content.

New investors Blueprint Ventures joined existing investors Draper Fisher Jurveston, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Sprout Group and Zone Ventures in the $15.5-million Series-C round.

The news comes about two months after AT&T announced it would offer Akimbo’s on-demand video content to subscribers of its Homezone TV service. AT&T is expected to launch Homezone this summer with the help of partners Yahoo! and DISH Network for satellite TV.

Akimbo claims to have about 200 content partners worldwide and a library of more than 10,000 shows and movies. It offers access to that content for monthly fees of $9 or a “lifetime” membership for $200.

Its service is offered through Microsoft Media Center PCs and through its own $200 set-top box, but the company intends for its technology to be integrated into other vendors’ products. This fall Thomson will launch its own Akimbo set-top box, the RCA Akimbo Player. Last year, Akimbo’s Chief Executive Officer Josh Goldman told Telephony, “We're not about selling hardware. We're all about making this run as a service, and the best way to make this run is to get it built into other devices. Unfortunately, because we were so early in doing this, we did put out a device. But long-term, that's a means to an end. It's just a way to show that this works.”

Cisco’s acquisition of Scientific Atlanta last year made it a major provider of set-top boxes and, with this week’s investment, a likely candidate to integrate Akimbo’s player into its popular home entertainment hardware.

The latest round brings Akimbo’s total funding to $32.5 million. The company’s previous round was a $12-million Series B announced in the summer of 2004.