HTC buys large stake in SyncTV
HTC certainly has something up its sleeves: just days after its acquisition of the MOG streaming music service, HTC has announced a deal with Intertrust to purchase a 20% stake of SyncTV. Additionally, HTC also acquired a broad portfolio of patents from Intertrust that primarily surround DRM technology.
Right now, it's unclear exactly what HTC plans to do with all of this, although signs point to HTC possibly offering a wide variety of streaming entertainment options on future devices, and perhaps even the next EVO. This seems especially likely given to HTC's hopeful language in its press release, which you can read below.
As part of a strategic initiative to improve the robustness, privacy and security of Android and Windows Phone mobile devices, Intertrust Technologies Corporation, the world' leading inventor and licensor of trusted distributed computing technologies, and HTC Corporation (TWSE: 2498), a global leader in mobile innovation and design, today announced a broad strategic technology partnership.
HTC joins many of the world's leading handset manufacturers in licensing Intertrust's patents, securing worldwide access to Intertrust's fundamental patent portfolio in trusted distributed computing and digital rights management (DRM).
Further, as part of HTC's ongoing efforts to create comprehensive mobile experiences for consumers, it has acquired 20% of Intertrust's SyncTV subsidiary. SyncTV is a cloud-based video service that delivers video over the Internet to a broad set of devices, including Android, Windows Phone, XBOX, iOS and Internet-enabled televisions. HTC has also license Intertrust's broadly deployed open standards based Marlin DRM software. Marlin DRM is used to protect and manage content in various national video distribution ecosystems in Japan, China and Europe.
"HTC's growth in the smartphone market is admirable, their innovative devices have come to define a category and have been broadly emulated by others," said Talal Shamoon, chief executive officer of Intertrust. "We are honored that HTC has license Intertrust technology and we look forward to working together in areas of mutual interest."
[Engadget]
