Samsung has confirmed that they have purchased media streaming and entertainment startup Boxee. This is the company behind the Boxee Box and the recently launched Boxee Cloud DVR.
The specifics of the deal have not been made public though some sources suggest that Samsung paid close to $30 million for Boxee’s 45 person team. It’s not clear if Samsung plans to completely integrate the team’s products into their own or if new Boxee products will be launched later on.
However, the South Korean manufacturer has been pushing Smart TVs, capable of browsing the web and playing video over the internet but they have yet to make any considerable headway in the market. The addition of Boxee software might be exactly what Samsung’s TVs need to better appeal to consumers.
As for the future of Boxee hardware there’s no doubt that there will be major changes coming. Up until now the company’s hardware has been manufactured by D-Link, but with this purchase Samsung will, no doubt, want to build the hardware themselves. The again if the software is integrated directly into Samsung’s Smart TVs then the hardware side of things will be altogether abandoned.
We’ll have to wait and see what comes out of this deal but, as fans of the original Boxee Box, we hope the company doesn"t completely disappear under Samsung’s umbrella.
Source: New York Times