Mountain View, California — Ever since its introduction, Google TV has hardly been able to kindle the nations living rooms on fire with their Internet-enriched television goodness. But, industry pundits were shocked over the weekend with news that Google has snapped up a digital video recording (DVR) software company SageTV, which indicates that a dire Google TV upgrade may be around the corner.
Details of the surprising announcement were dispatched via an email to SageTV customers, as well as on the company’s website, which has ceased all functionality aside from a landing page that explains the acquisition.
Sage TV’s application runs on Mac OS X, Windows and Linux, and as Google TV just happens to lack a DVR functionality such as (TiVo) and a placeshifting function akin to (Slingbox). However, neither financial terms of the acquisition or specific future plans have been revealed by either company.
In its email to customers, SageTV explained that its store has been entirely shut down, but customer support for its DVR products “will function as usual until further notice.” The SageTV forum will remain up and running, the company said.
“As the media perspective continues to evolve, we think it is time our vision of entertainment management grows as well,” said SageTV in a statement. “By teaming up with Google, we believe our ideas will reach an even larger audience of users worldwide on many different products, platforms and services.”
While announcing the acquisition over the weekend, SageTV was reserved about its future, saying that: “By associating with Google, we believe our ideas will reach an even larger audience of users worldwide on many different products, platforms and services.”
The statement goes on to explain how “Google’s developer efforts are designed to stimulate innovation across the web, and as developers have played a core role in the success of SageTV, we think our shared perception for open technology will help us advance the online entertainment experience. We look forward to joining Google.”
Google’s statement (via Engadget) on the acquisition is: “The SageTV team has developed the latest in media management software, and we look forward to working with them to take this technology to the next level.”
Established in 2002, SageTV has been developing versatile DVR software that runs on Mac OS X, Linux and Windows operating systems. The applications flexibility makes it possible to transform almost any computer with a TV tuner card into the primary hub of a home entertainment system.
The platform empowers users to record live television, including full seasons, thanks to support for antenna TV, cable, and satellite, as well as view photos and listen to music on their television sets from a host PC. Also, the hallmark place-shifting feature allows people to start watching a show on one device, such as their PC or Mac, and continue watching it elsewhere, including on mobile devices or even in the car.
Interestingly, SageTV application absorbs nearly any audio, video or photo file format flipped its way, so a machine bundled with SageTV becomes one of the most powerful consumer products available.
Though speculation abounds over what Google has in store for SageTV, one possibility is that the service will be incorporated into Google TV. Some popular characteristics included Internet video and Netflix support; commercial auto-skip and clean, easy navigation.
Besides, the company has also produced set-top boxes that can play media directly from a USB drive, SageTV became a hit amongst the tech-savvy crowd. However, not everyone is convinced that SageTV will be coming to Google TV.
“I consider it impossible that Google acquired SageTV so they could add native DVR capabilities to Google TV,” Rakesh Agrawal, founder of SnapStream, a service that directly competed with SageTV before transitioning to “TV search,” said in a blog post. “Remember, Google already manages the program guide, channel changing, and even automating your native DVR.”
Watch a video about SageTV software:
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