The TV industry is in a race to data enable its ad inventory to keep pace with online video and digital alternatives like Facebook and Google that offer finely-grained audience data at massive scale. Earlier this week TiVo Research and Cadent announced a new joint solution that is another good example of how the industry is creatively pursuing data enablement to build more targeting value across its inventory.

The solution relies on viewership data from TiVo Research’s 2.3 million household sample. Cadent is using this data, along with first and third party data sources, to better index its 80 million home universe watching the 70+ cable TV networks in which Cadent aggregates unsold inventory. As Cadent’s CEO Nick Troiano explained in a briefing, by finding high-indexing homes, Cadent can provide more value to advertisers looking to reach their target audiences.

Because Cadent is the largest aggregator of unsold inventory across numerous networks gain greater scale than if they were trying to find high-indexing homes working with individual networks directly. With the TiVo and other data, Cadent can put together a plan for how to optimally target specific programs and dayparts on TV networks for maximum impact.

The first agency taking advantage of the new joint solution is GroupM’s Modi Media, which specializes in campaigns to addressable set-top boxes. Modi can combine the Cadent-TiVo data with its own data to offer clients even more refined targeting. Nick said at least 2 other agencies using the joint solution will be announced soon.