Eric Schmidt Says You’ll Own a Google TV Sooner or Later
Google TV, the search company’s fledgling — and failing — smart TV platform, is destined for a big comeback in another few months. In fact, it will be ubiquitous across the TV industry.
That’s Google Chairman Eric Schmidt’s prediction, anyway.
Evidently, Schmidt views Logitech’s decision to abandon Google TV after a costly misadventure as confirmation of the platform’s consumer appeal and not its ill-starred future.
Speaking at the Le Web conference Thursday, Schmidt said Google TV, which is currently available only in Logitech’s now-abandoned Revue set-top box and Sony’s Internet TV, will sweep the television industry next year, penetrating its every corner.
“By the summer of 2012, the majority of the televisions that you see in stores will have Google TV embedded in them,” Schmidt said.
Really?
To pull that off Google will have to ink deals with a number of other big TV manufacturers — LG, Samsung, Sharp, and Philips — some of whom already have their own proprietary smart TV platforms. Indeed, LG, Philips and Sharp announced a joint platform in September. So either Schmidt knows something we don’t — i.e., a bunch of OEMs have already signed Google TV deals — or he’s just talking nonsense.