Google TV and Samsung do a Deal?

Posted by Richard Kastelein in Breaking News on November 22, 2011  |  0 Comments More from this author  |    |  Follow Richard Kastelein on: Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter | YouTube

Korea's Yonhap News is reporting that Samsung today confirmed it was in the final stages of signing a deal with Google to utilise its Android-based software to power its new Internet-connected television sets, but declined to reveal when new sets would become available.

Samsung has not yet decided if it will unveil the Samsung-backed Google TV during a January consumer electronics show in Las Vegas, Yoon told reporters on the sidelines of a conference.

 The adoption of Google's TV operating system by Samsung, the world's largest TV supplier, will likely boost the U.S. search engine operator's TV project, which has not made a big mark in the market. Market watchers expect TVs to be the next battle stage for global mobile software companies, such as Google, Apple Inc. and Microsoft Corp., as consumers seek to watch, share and access content from multiple screens. The Google TV project to seamlessly mesh the Internet with the living room staple faced a backlash when one of its partners announced departure earlier this month.

... Google, which introduced an update to its TV software last month, has been seeking to woo Korean TV vendors, the world's two-biggest players in the market, to expand sales.

LG Electronics Inc., the world's second-largest maker of flat-screen TVs, plans to unveil its Google TV at the January trade show in Las Vegas, Bloomberg reported earlier citing two unnamed sources.

From The Next Web:

It’s an interesting decision by Samsung, a company that has already built its own Smart TV platform. In October, the company announced that it had surpassed 1,000 apps on its Samsung Apps TV store, also noting that it has now facilitated over 10 million downloads since the platform launched. The television-centric app store was reported to be handling around 50,000 downloads each day, as its users began to realise the potential of third-party tools and services that can extend the capabilities of their TVs.

The adoption of Google’s Android-powered platform demonstrates Samsung’s continued support for the Linux-based platform, software that powers its most popular smartphone devices, including the Samsung Galaxy S II. Developers and vendors are encouraged to create their own apps and services to extend the platform, making money from downloads in the process.