7:16pm EDT, Thu Sep 2

New Vizio HDTVs Preview the Future of TV

By: The Online Reporter
Publish Date: June 26, 2009

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- Thousands of Movies, Millions of Songs - Widgets, Widgets, Widgets Vizio’s new Net-savvy TVs are both the future of TV and the TVs of the future. Vizio, which with Wal-Mart moved the US market to 42-inch HD sets under $1,000, is aiming to take the lead in TVs that are not just Internet-enabled, but Internet-smart, ready to access thousands of movies and millions of songs with a single remote. Its Vizio Internet Apps (VIA) service has picked up some major new services, a suite that makes the TV set itself look like a better- connected system than a Windows Media Server, TiVo or just about any other set-top box. Content partners cover everything from streaming movies and TV shows to fantasy sports and checking e-mail: - Amazon on Demand: 500 HD movies and 40,000 SD movies available for streaming. - Netflix: 12,000 titles available for instant streaming. - VUDU: 14,000 SD movies and TV shows and 1,500 HD films available in two HD standards. - Blockbuster on Demand: Roughly 10,000 SD titles. - Showtime: Mainly bonus content to its TV offering with some sample episodes from its hit series. - Revision 3: 16 Web series on technology that are viewer-driven. - Rallypoint Sports: HDTV-geared fantasy sports and e-commerce service. - Pandora: Full access to the service with existing user-created Internet radio stations and the ability to create new ones. - Rhapsody: More than 7 million on-demand songs. - Radiotime: 60,000 AM, FM and Internet radio stations in 140 countries and 55 languages. - Flickr: Searching and viewing; no word on uploads just yet but the ability is likely. - eBay: Full access to the site, from searching to buying and selling. - Facebook: The standard social networking service, though it might be somewhat limited, like smartphone apps are. - Twitter: Full access to the service. - Accedo Broadband: TV-centric apps like games, puzzles, radio, news, e-mail and karaoke. A better list of content partners for any piece of consumer electronics, especially a TV set, is nigh impossible to find. These services are a mix of free, subscription and pay-per-use, meaning the set will appeal to a wide range of users and wallets. If the VUDU offering comes with that service’s “Labs” feature, the available content will also include music videos, animation and a handful of other services. All these services are powered by the Yahoo TV Widgets engine, so there are other services on the Yahoo Widgets platform that could be added and incorporated before the sets are available. The platform supports both Adobe’s Flash and Microsoft’s Silverlight. Lucas Mast of Yahoo’s Widgets said users “can customize [their] experience in the Widget Gallery, so if any widget falls out of favor, you can simply delete it, much like you would on the iPhone.” Mast also said Yahoo aims to have 100 widgets available on its platform by the end of the year. As this gets more mainstream, the platform could look more and more like an app store, where users can pick and choose from a wide variety and where anyone can make an app. The Vizio Lineup VIA-connected HDTV sets connect through either an 802.11n Wi-Fi connection or a built-in Ethernet port. The set’s remote has a built- in keyboard, which means all of these services should function well without any additional hardware. Vizio announced the first three sets that will feature these VIA offerings and said they will hit the market before the end of the year. All the sets are part of Vizio’s XVT line. The first two models use LCD screens with LED backlighting and have 240HZ refresh rates. The VF552XVT is a 55-inch set that’s expected to retail for under $2,200 and be available in December. The SV472XVT is a 47-inch set that will be available in October for under $1,700. The final announced VIA set is the SV422XVT, a 42-inch model that does not have the LED backlighting and has a refresh rate of 120Hz. It will retail for under $1,200 and be available in November. The Rise of Vizio Since 2007, Vizio HDTV shipments have been ranked near the top in the US, and it was No. 1 in Q1 2009 with over 20% market share. Vizio first found major success with Wal-Mart when the two dropped HDTV sets below the $1,000 price point in 2006 on “Black Friday” — the post-Thanksgiving sales blitz and unofficial start of the US holiday shopping season. Because of this low-price beginning and its continued relationship with Wal-Mart, Vizio is often thought of as a low- to mid-tier brand, but everyone can put that notion aside. Not only has Vizio captured a large share of the market by making its products available at low-price retailers like Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, Target and Costco, it will likely bring this top-of-the-line set to those same retailers. In the US, the electronics retailer Best Buy is now even running HDTV commercials directly targeting Wal-Mart and its customers – noting that it carries the same brands as Wal-Mart. The Net-Connected Future Yahoo has announced partnerships with Samsung, Sony, LG and Vizio to put its widget engine on their TV sets, so this market is going to get crowded. The real success or failure of these sets will come a few months down the road when the holiday shopping season begins. Consumers will face the choice of buying a new set or a set-top box that provides much of the same content and functionality. This will be a tough hill to climb for the set makers, especially when the $99 Roku box already offers a lot of these services, plus some extras like YouTube. There’s also not likely to be a large initial uptake, as most people aren’t looking to replace HDTV sets that are only a year or two old and the current economic situation will keep some willing parties from being able to upgrade. As more and more sets come to market with Yahoo’s Widgets engine or other Net-enabled platforms, the problem of differentiation is going to arise. The Vizio partners are on board through Yahoo’s system, which means the other three TV makers joining with Yahoo will likely have access to the same content — though some exclusive deals are likely down the road. If that’s the case, Vizio has a great track record for leading the market through the balance it strikes between price and device. The future of TV starts in October when the first TVs of the future become available.