A startling picture for Smart TVs

With 22 of Samsung's 25 recently released television products falling into the 'Smart TV' category, and LG delivering a product with localised content, television web browsing and online video streaming may finally be delivered on a larger scale.

Analysts at Gartner have called the current worldwide smart TV offering “a collection of technologies in search of consumer demand”, but for chip manufacturers and others invested in desktop PCs there's strong hope smart televisions might provide the market needed to replace what has been lost to mobile devices. 

It's a prospect that could greatly help the fortunes of chip manufacturer Intel which had already surprised the doom and gloom merchants predicting the demise of its business on the back of the tablet market, when it delivered its quarterly results last month.

Most analysts still weren't satisfied with Intel's 29 per cent lift in profit for the quarter and the press interviews that followed were full of questions on what exactly the chip maker was going to do to beat out competitors like ARM, Nvidia and Qualcomm in the mobile market. 

Intel chief Paul Otellini talked up the company's plans for the smartphone market, and predicted double digit growth for PCs on the back of emerging markets and the corporate sector.

But he said little on the progress of Google TV. 

That's probably because Intel remains locked in a battle with other chip makers to get a hold on the television market.

Otellini sits on the board of Google and last year struck a deal with the search engine giant to take on Apple in the smart TV market. Google TV now features in Sony Internet TVs and in a separate set top box that can be used with high definition TVs, similar to Apple TV. Sony TVs are now being shipped with apps including YouTube, Napster, Twitter and Netflix pre-installed. 

Meanwhile, Samsung, which manufactures its own chips, refused to use Intel chips in order to offer Google TV.

Not surprisingly, television manufacturers aren't too keen to see their products commoditised further by a third party, and are now seeking deals with content providers to help differentiate their consumer offerings. 

In fact, the media and content sector may stand to gain more than chip makers, with Comcast, Time Warner, Hulu and Adobe all part of a recent deal with Samsung. The Korean giant is also taking on Apple with its support for the developer community, part of its plans to grow its own apps library, which has already seen more than two million applications downloaded.

Closer to home, Telstra has released BigPond Movies for Samsung and LG's Internet enabled devices, extending its IPTV service which includes several streamed channels. 

Hybrid TV chief executive Robbee Minicola says content providers need to broaden their horizons and start talking to television manufacturers as well as broadcasters, or risk having other players determine the delivery of their content.

It's a view that seems to be shared by Gartner which recommends video content providers work with manufacturers to ensure inclusion and interoperability of the most promising platforms, including tablet devices, smartphones and connected TVs. 

But first, consumers will have to get over Internet drop-outs and slow TV start-up speeds, when they've been trained on mobile touch-screens that are always on.

As Internet speeds improve, jostling in the smart TV market could help determine which devices consumers really need, and whether connected TVs, and more critically the tablet PC (aka the 'third screen'), are here to stay.