The BBC has launched its BBC News product for connected TV which will bring video news clips via the web to living-room TV screens.
The BBC News product for connected TV combines existing video and text content from BBC News Online and will initially be made available on Samsung’s range of Smart TVs.
It will subsequently be made available on a range of connected devices over time.
The development reflects the BBC’s strategy to deliver greater value for money for licence-fee payers by repurposing BBC Online products for a wide range of devices. The launch aims to tap into the growing internet-connected TV market, with predictions that almost 36 million TVs with built-in internet capability will be installed in UK homes by the end of 2016.
The BBC News product for connected TV has been designed as a complement to the BBC’s live 24-hour news channel. Editorial teams in the newsrooms will curate clips around the clock to run alongside text-based news from BBC News Online – all started, stopped, and navigated via the remote control.
Phil Fearnley, General Manager for News & Knowledge in BBC Future Media, said: “Internet-connected TV is developing as a medium and presents an exciting and engaging complement to our existing TV services. As we’ve seen with BBC iPlayer in the UK, and our global smartphone applications, audiences enjoy the freedom and flexibility of BBC services at a time and place that suits them – whether on the move or on the living-room TV.
“Looking forward, we are particularly interested in creating seamless, personalised, and location-aware experiences of BBC News across all connected devices – mobiles, tablets, computers, and TVs. Internet-connected TV is still in its infancy, but innovations such as this hint at the long-term creative potential of the internet as a medium.”
Steve Herrmann, Editor of the BBC News website, said: “By combining the latest and best reports in video from the BBC’s unrivalled newsgathering and TV news teams with the extensive range of up-to-the-minute reporting from the BBC News website, this service broadens the availability of the BBC’s world-class journalism to audiences in a new and innovative on-demand format.”
The BBC News product for connected TV will be available free of charge and will be accessible from within the Samsung Apps Store on Samsung Smart TVs from today (Friday 17 June). BBC Worldwide will also launch an international version of the product which will be advertising supported.
