Sky’s director of TV Product Development, Brian Lenz, has implied that Virgin Media’s Tivo service, when it launches in January, will give the satellite broadcast little to be worried about.

When asked what he thought of the social aspects of the new television service due out from Virgin Media in the coming months, thanks to a new Tivo powered set top box, Lenz said:

“I think that a lot of those functions are functions. They aren't necessarily things that will fundamentally change your happiness with your TV. They’ve [Virgin Media] thrown a lot of stuff up there and Tivo has always been about lots of high-end functionality”.

“It will appeal to certain super users. It will certainly give us some things to think about, but all those things we’ve looked at, but you have to ask whether they are mass market and whether your average viewer wants them”.

If that’s not enough to put a downer on it, Lenz also argues that, “It’s a pretty expensive box that you don’t own. And we still have the content range”.

But it’s not all bad, Lenz does believe that Virgin Media has “upped their game”, and that their “TV product has improved”.

Improved enough to challenge Sky? Errr, no.

“I still think our TV products are superior across all dimensions. The point is, that in this business, you can’t stand still, they aren’t standing still and we aren’t standing still either. We will try and play our strengths and they will play theirs”.

Which service do you believe is better? Is Lenz right or will Virgin Media have a new service come 2011 that will prove him wrong? Let us know in the comments below.