OpenTV

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OpenTV

Type	NASDAQ: OPTV
Founded	1994
Headquarters	San Francisco, USA
Industry	Interactive television
Products	Television operating systems and Middleware
Revenue	$110 million (USD) in 2007
Employees	500
Website	www.OpenTV.com

OpenTV (NASDAQ: OPTV) is an interactive television company founded in 1994. Its main business involves the sale of set-top-box operating systems and software. OpenTV is quoted on the NASDAQ under OPTV and the majority shareholder is the Kudelski Group.

1 OpenTV Core middleware
- 1.1 OpenTV Virtual Machine execution environment
- 1.2 FSF lawsuit against OpenTV
2 See also
3 External links
4 References

[edit] OpenTV Core middleware

OpenTV's flagship product is OpenTV Core, a widely deployed digital television middleware. OpenTV Core software technology contains a hardware abstraction layer to enable hardware independence, TV libraries, a selection of application execution environments, and support for Personal Video Recorders (PVRs) to create a digital television environment for set-top box.

OpenTV Core middleware has shipped some 100 million set-top boxes worldwide (February 2007)^[1] on 37 set-top-box manufacturers.

OpenTV supports interactive advertising. They purchased CAM Systems in 2005, an advertising traffic & Billing solution for US cable (Comcast). OpenTV provides system for allocation, scheduling, traffic, verification, and billing and supports local ad insertion/targeting at the headend or on the set-top, ad telescoping using VOD and PVR, enhanced TV for consumer call-to-action and audience measurement solutions for campaign effectiveness.

[edit] OpenTV Virtual Machine execution environment

OpenTV applications are written in C, using own compiler, gcco, which outputs o-code (like .exe under windows) which is then run on many set-top-boxes. The OpenTV API wrap all the hardware functions, including data transmission (one-way satellite broadcasts, full bi-directional links such as a modem or hard-wired serial port and high-speed broadband networks).

[edit] FSF lawsuit against OpenTV

In 2002, the FSF engaged in a GPL enforcement action against OpenTV. According to Forbes, OpenTV ended up paying the FSF $65,000. But OpenTV also reportedly complied by making available the requested code, so the purpose of the payment is unclear. The FSF's stated mission is not to demand money damages for GPL violations.^[2]