ACCESS NetFront Browser powers Pixsan Universal Television Kit

ACCESS NetFront™ Browser powers the Pixsan Universal Television Kit solution for HbbTV2.0

OBERHAUSEN, Germany — ACCESS CO., LTD., a global provider of advanced software technologies to the automotive, mobile, Internet of Things (IoT) and digital TV markets, and Pixsan, today announced that ACCESS NetFront™ Browser DTV Profile HbbTV Edition will be pre-integrated for the Universal Television Kit (UTK). NetFront Browser provides HTML5 and HbbTV 2.0 functionality to UTK, enabling device manufacturers to utilize a complete turnkey software package for HbbTV markets. The initial launch will be for the UK and Freeview Play. The companies will host a demonstration of their joint solution at the 4th annual HbbTV Symposium in London on the 8th and 9th of December.

“It’s exciting to play an important part in the UTK project, which provides a client middleware stack for hybrid TV and is quickly gaining traction with device manufacturers,” said Dr. Neale Foster, COO and VP Global Sales, ACCESS Europe. “The pre-integration of the UTK middleware platform with our NetFront Browser DTV Profile HbbTV Edition for HbbTV 2.0 speeds the time-to-market for manufacturers wishing to deliver HbbTV2.0 STBs and TVs.”

The integration of UTK and NetFront Browser provides a robust broadcast TV platform with all the functionality that consumers expect, enabling TV viewers to access catch-up TV services and all the advanced new user experiences provided by HbbTV support.

NetFront™ Browser DTV Profile HbbTV Edition is a market-leading, high performance HTML5-capable and platform-independent HbbTV software solution that enables device manufacturers, middleware companies and operators to quickly and affordably launch or upgrade HbbTV capable devices and services.

The NetFront Browser family includes versions based upon WebKit and Chromium Blink engines, giving ACCESS customers the choice of HTML5-based software development kits to best suit their platform and deployment needs. ACCESS provides the most advanced and versatile HTML5 browser solutions for digital TVs, set-top boxes and other IP-connected devices within the Internet Of Things. NetFront Browser is widely recognized worldwide as one of the leading browsers in the Smart TV and game console markets. Enhancing the leading browser engines for HTML 5 layout with HbbTV and adding technology deployed in over 1.5 billion units worldwide enables ACCESS to provide the highest level of standards compliance along with the ability to take advantage of hardware specific features such as graphics processing units to produce a high performance and tightly integrated solution.

As the key module in a complete HbbTV package, NetFront Browser NX DTV Profile HbbTV Edition presents and executes an interactive application that combines an associated collection of documents (typically JavaScript™, CSS and HTML documents) with content from the DSM-CC Object Carousel.

“The commitment of ACCESS to early and deep support for all relevant Internet and TV standards combined with its European based engineering expertise are vital for the progression of the UTK project., ACCESS has been hugely supportive of the new approach the project is taking to improving innovation, rationalizing maintenance and adding value where it matters for manufacturers and operators,” commented Jon Williams, Founder and CEO, Pixsan.

UTK is a shared source project, which offers its licensees complete source code access and the license to ship unlimited TVs and STBs on a zero royalty basis for the core code. Pixsan provides all the access, tools and support for licensees to innovate their devices. UTK is based on open source frameworks and is available to be ported and delivered on all leading SoC platforms with support for the common DRM and CAS security systems.