Broadcast Newsroom has a new article on TiVo’s software development efforts for Comcast, which shed some light on the lengthy development process.

“The idea was” if you could somehow take a generic [set-top] box and download the TiVo software over the wire, if you could order it from your cable company like HBO” it would be an incredible product,” [TiVo CEO Tom] Rogers said.

However, according to Rogers, the development was “much easier said than done.”

“It was an enormous piece of rocket science to work with hardware, chips we don’t control,” he said.

There is something interesting in the article from a revenue standpoint as well:

TiVo hopes that through the cable partners it can drive additional interactive advertising revenue. As part of the deal with Comcast, Rogers said, “in every TiVo home, we have the right to sell the interactive overlay on every commercial, on every network” That’s an incredibly powerful franchise we can develop… so we can look to diversify our business model.”

Check out the full article for more.