DirecTV wins CES “Innovation Award”
January 7, 2015
By Chris Forrester
The CES 2015 Innovation Award has gone to DirecTV for its 4K Ultra HDTV VoD service, which utilises the RVU Alliance’s Remote User Interface which allows direct decoding of the 4K video and User Interface on RVU compliant TVs, removing the need for a separate 4K set-top box.
The RVU guidelines and certification program were enhanced this past year to support 4K content delivery, with Samsung being the first TV manufacturer to introduce complaint RVU TV client solutions as a software update to their 2014 4K Ultra High Definition TV range. DirecTV, at the moment, can only stream 4K material to suitable Samsung 4K TVs. LG Electronics’ webOS smart TV platform was the first to receive RVU 2.0 certification, which updates the specification to include capabilities for more enhanced user interfaces.
The RVU technology claims to be the leading solution for Pay TV content and User Interface distribution throughout the home. The RVU 2.0 specification enables immersive and engaging User Interfaces by leveraging the advanced capabilities of HTML-5 Canvas while its rapid expansion to include 4K UHD support reflects its ease of implementation. New RVU member companies Panasonic and Sharp are actively developing platforms for launch in 2015. They join LG Electronics, Sony and Toshiba, which have already launched HD compliant RVU solutions, in addition to the 4K RVU compliant TV update from Samsung.