ViewSonic on Thursday announced that they are no longer planning to release a smart TV running Boxee media center software, at least not anytime soon.
Speaking to GigaOM the company revealed that the high cost of integrating the system, along with a general lack of market interest in Smart TVs along with a slow economy simply made the program lose profitability.
Viewsonic says they will stay involved in “various technology developments” and if Boxee plays into those developments the system could be integrated in the future. Essentially Viewsonic wants hardward to become cheaper, therefore allowing for easier penetration of the smart TV market.
The company had shown off a Boxee prototype at CES, however very little further press was release for that system.
For their part Boxee officials seem to believe that the program will eventually move forward, noting that it has only been delayed “for the moment”
In the meantime Boxee is still working closely with Iomega with their first product due out in October which will combine Boxee software with the company’s network attached storage (NAS) devices. Boxee also plans to integrate their software in more hardware company options in the future.
With so many options to choose from these days, including capabilities from Apple TV and Google TV I’m not surprised that Viewsonic is taking a step back to evaluate the market before they invest heavily in a yet to be proven model.
Are you willing to spend extra money on a smart TV?
