Google already dominates the internet and in the last year has become a major player in the cellphone market. Now, it has eyes on the world’s televisions.
The internet search giant on Thursday unveiled a new service called Google TV that aims to simplify the often bewildering prospect of finding programmes to watch and record on hundreds of cable and satellite channels. It also will allow users to search programming on the internet.
The service will be incorporated into televisions and Blu-ray players made by Sony and set-top boxes from Logitech and will launch in time for the vital holiday season, Google announced at its developer conference. The company declined to detail the retail cost of the new device.
Google chief executive Eric Schmidt acknowledged the many challenges of melding television and the internet, which has been tried before by companies such as Microsoft and Apple without sparking much enthusiasm from consumers.
“It’s much harder to marry a 50—year—old technology and a brand— new technology than those of us from the brand—new technology industry thought,” he said.
The Google service will run on the same Android operating system that has quickly gained a major segment of the smart phone market, and also will use the Chrome browser, which is rapidly becoming the browser of choice among savvy internet users.
“As other technologies have evolved and changed, TV has remained the same,” Rishi Chandra, Google’s project leader, told 5,000 developers gathered for the conference. “Video should be consumed on the biggest, best and brightest screen in the house, and that is a TV.” The service aims to turn the TV into a regular internet terminal, allowing people to access services like Facebook, Twitter or any internet site while they are watching programmes on a split screen.
“The Web is unlimited, and now your TV is unlimited as well,” Mr. Chandra said.
