Broadband TV News speaks with Ye Wang, the CEO of SERAPHIC, about recent developments at his company and its plans for the future.
What have been the major developments at SERAPHIC in the past year?
SERAPHIC raised around $10 million in growth capital in the recent financing. We use the funding to enhance our OTT-related competencies, continuously increase the market share, and expand global operations (especially in Latin America and Europe) as well as empower smart TVs to embrace AI technologies.
Have you entered into any new partnerships and markets?
First of all, we have devoted ourselves a lot to the support of Android TV and hence more and more major TV brands, ODMs, set-top box manufacturers and design houses have rolled out or will soon debut their Android TV devices based on SERAPHIC browser products including TV browser, OTT platform and hybrid protocol stacks such as HbbTV2 and Freeview Play. Secondly, in partnership with quite a few OTT content providers and aggregators as well as digital marketing players, SERAPHIC plays a more and more important role in OTT merchandising. Lastly, aiming at making TV the intelligence center of smart homes, we’ve made close collaboration with major SoC vendors such as MTK, AI algorithm companies and AI content providers to build avant-garde AI applications on smart TVs. We plan to unveil more details in Q4 this year.
Are there any specific products you are currently developing?
1)SERAPHIC keeps up to date with frontier browser technologies, based on the latest Chromium/Blink open source, to enable rich web capability on DTV/STB devices.
2)We catch up with the latest hybrid TV standards including Freeview Play 2020, HbbTV 2.0.2, OpApp, etc.
3)We also work on Target AD, the new specification that is being developed by HbbTV Association.
4)Furthermore, SERAPHIC introduces the brand-new and user-friendly UI on Sraf open browser to enrich more OTT contents to end users in a more convenient way.
What will you be showcasing at IBC?
1)HbbTV/Freeview Play/OpApp demonstrations which are our traditional strength to provide the open standard hybrid solutions for smart TV/STB devices. SERAPHIC is one of the key vendors in this area and dedicated to continuing to play an important role. These demos show our recent updates to align with the latest update from these standards.
2)The latest browser SDK based on up-to-date Blink browser engine to show features such as WebAssembly. SERAPHIC continues to invest in the browser technology innovation for DTV/STB industry.
3)Hybrid TV solution on Android demonstration. Android is one alternative smart TV platform and eco-system which is winning a significant position in DTV field. SERAPHIC enables the open standard hybrid solution for Android, which will enrich more OTT content to end users.
How do you see SERAPHIC’s role in the AI space and smart home?
AI is a hot topic especially with the big screen, coming with the AI ability from server to terminal. Combining voice and image input peripherals as well as a lot more features connected with DTV, a wealth of AI scenarios can be expected.
As the centre of a living room, TV owns a very big chance to play as the hub of smart homes. Interoperability is the key thing to think about for smart home as currently there are many players and proprietary standards. SERAPHIC is looking for opportunities to deliver added value, such as application deployment, security and inter-operations, via open standards to the eco-system.
SERAPHIC is at the heart of DTV supply chain, APAC, where AI is booming up. With the closest space and time distance with TV manufacturers, SoC vendors and algorithm companies, SERAPHIC will contribute to the fast deployment of AI applications by leveraging the tremendous experience on the web applications on smart TVs.
How do you see the market developing, and SERAPHIC’s role in it, in the next 1-3 years?
Smart TV will play a central role in the following three fields: hub of home entertainment with incomparable audiovisual competence, hub of information from and notifications about the IoT devices in the smart-home environment as well as the control hub of IoT devices. SERAPHIC will play an increasingly important role in providing the entrance to the web-based entertaining content, accelerating the OTT merchandising, enabling profound analytics, delivering personalized TV user experience and transforming large-screen devices from smart TVs to intelligent panels based on latest AI technologies.
