Advanced Television

Google’s Chromecast in 11 more countries

March 19, 2014

Colin Mann @ TV Connect

ChromecastGoogle has announced that its wireless video streaming device Chromecast is to roll out in additional territories. In a blog post, the company confirmed that Chromecast is now available in an additional 11 countries – Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the UK.

Mario Queiroz, Vice President of Product Management, Chromecast wrote that in addition to favourite apps such as YouTube, Google Play Movies, Google Play Music and Netflix (where available), the company was working with local content providers to bring even more of the movies and TV shows people love to Chromecast. “Apps will start rolling out today, and include BBC iPlayer in theUK; France TV Pluzz and SFR TV in France with CANALPLAY coming soon; and Watchever in Germany with Maxdome coming soon. So instead of huddling around your laptop to watch Sherlock solve the next crime or getting caught up on all the workplace drama in Stramberg, you can cast it, sit back, and watch together on the big screen,” he said.

“Chromecast will keep getting better. We recently opened up Chromecast to developers, and in a few short weeks more than 3,000 developers worldwide have signed up to bring their apps and websites to Chromecast. You’ll soon have more TV shows, movies, videos, sports, music and games to choose from. Stay up-to-date on the latest apps that work with Chromecast at chromecast.com/apps.” he said.

“So if you’re in one of these 11 countries, look for Chromecast starting today at Amazon, Google Play, Currys PC World, Elkjøp, FNAC, Saturn, Media Markt and other retailers,” he advised.

With a UK retail price of £30, it undercuts Roku 3’s recommended retail price of £99, and its recently-released HDMI streaming stick (£49.99), but is beaten by Sky TV’s £9.99 NOW TV Box, which is manufactured by Roku.

The BBC will be enabling Chromecast support for the Chrome web browser on Mac, Windows, Linux, and ChromeOS desktop and laptop computers for the new web version of BBC iPlayer, and will be looking at adding support for audio-only streams. Aside from this and making tweaks and improvements to the existing BBC iPlayer application, the BBC will also be working with other development teams in the BBC to add Chromecast support to other apps such as the BBC Sport app.

Categories: Articles, Connected TV, OTT