Google develops TV project

Google is working with Intel, Sony and Logitech to bring web software to televisions, according to reports.  The project, called Google TV, will combine the company's Android mobile operating system and applications with television devices made for the operating system, including set-top boxes. It will use Intel chips and a small keyboard developed by SwitzerlandÔÇÖs Logitech that operates as a remote control. Mountain View, California-based Google will also develop a new version of its Chrome browser for the project, which has reportedly been underway for a number of months already. For Santa Clara-based Intel, which generates 90 percent of its revenue from PC chips, Google TV is part of a strategy to get its processors into home electronics. Sony, which faces tough competition in the TV market, could be seeking to further differentiate its hardware, having already collaborated with Google in the market for electronic reading devices. Some existing televisions and set-top boxes already offer access to web content, but the choice of sites that can be accessed is limited. More than a quarter of TVs purchased by US consumers in January were models capable of linking to the web through a wi-fi or ethernet connection, according to research by ISuppli Corp. Google and its partners on the project hope to make it easy for consumers to use web applications such as Twitter on their TVs and to entice software developers to create new applications to run on Google TV. Google is expected to deliver a toolkit to external application programmers within the next few weeks. Products based on the software could appear as soon as this summer. The move is being seen as a challenge to Yahoo!, TiVo, Rovi and Microsoft in delivering the internet to television. Google and Intel are likely to want to extend their dominance of computing to television, an area in which thus far, their presence is limited. Analysts have said that a browser-based Google TV box would require an expensive chip, estimating that the product would probably cost $200 or more. The company has built a prototype set-top box, but the technology may be incorporated directly into TVs or other devices. YahooÔÇÖs TV software is installed in models from Sony, Samsung, LG Electronics and Vizio. Reports have suggested that Google has begun a limited test of the system with Dish Network, one of its partners in its TV Ads program, through which it sells advertising on some satellite and small cable television systems, as well as a few cable networks.