Time Warner Cable Offers TV Service To Samsung Sets Without A Box: Cable Show
While Comcast talks up the virtues of its new, high powered set top boxes, Time Warner Cable used this week’s Cable Show to showcase a different approach: It will launch an app for Samsung Smart TVs that will enable owners to watch pay TV programming without a box. The No. 2 cableco says its TWC TV app is part of its TV Everywhere strategy. In additional to their conventional channels, users will be able to access the company’s 5,000 video on demand titles from about 100 networks. Owners of 2012 Samsung Smart TVs will have first crack to download the free app; those who bought this year’s models will be able to download it “soon afterward,” the companies say. Time Warner Cable CEO Glenn Britt told analysts here today that the arrangement with Samsung is possible because “that TV has enough intelligence” to replace the functions of a set top box. He adds “that’s where I think we’re headed. … The technology is actually pretty easy. And I think that’s going to kind of reinvigorate the industry. I think all this over-the-top stuff is largely about functionality that’s enabled by technology that people haven’t been able to get with our traditional technology.”
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