Opera Puts TV App Store in MediaTek Smart TV Chips

Opera and MediaTek smart TV app store
Opera and MediaTek smart TV app store

Opera is working with Taiwanese semiconductor company MediaTek (TPE:2454.TW - News) to integrate the Opera TV Store (pictured) within its chips. Manufacturers who use MediaTek chipsets — be it TVs, set-top boxes, or media players — will be able to make use of web content provided by the Opera TV Store.

Opera (OSE:OPERA.OL - News) tells us that so far there are approximately 140 HTML5-based apps on its ‘smart TV’-oriented web marketplace: “The number of apps in the Opera TV Store is continuously growing, and will depend on OEM, launch region, and hardware capabilities.”

Apps that are available on the Opera TV Store include those by the Associate Press News, Facebook, Tunein Radio, Twitter, and Vimeo. Opera couldn’t comment on how many MediaTek-powered smart TVs or boxes it expects to sell this year. But so far, the Opera TV Store is already available on the popular Sony Bravia TVs and blu-ray DVD players.

As we saw last summer, smart TVs were most popular in Japan and China in 2012 among Asian nations.

Lars Boilesen, CEO of Opera, commented in today’s announcement:

Implementing the Opera TV Store in MediaTek’s smart TV solution will help to move smart TVs from being a novelty to the mainstream. Millions of app-hungry users will be able to enjoy a comfortable, ‘leanback’ experience on their TVs.


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