What we build
Smart TV app development for broadcasters
Television applications across every runtime in the living room, from one code base and one backlog.
We qualify hard, deliberately: if you want a single app on a single platform, almost any web agency can help you and we are the wrong call. What we are good at is the case where one editorial team has to serve four different televisions and cannot afford four of everything.
Platforms
| Platform | Runtime | Packaging | Distribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| HbbTV | browser runtime | URL + Content-Type | no store |
| Samsung Tizen | Chromium runtime | .wgt | Seller Office |
| LG webOS | Chromium runtime | .ipk | Content Store |
| Titan OS | Chromium runtime | hosted URL | Titan OS store |
| Whale OS | HTML5 browser runtime | hosted URL | Whale OS App Store |
They are not variants of one thing. The differences between them are the work. How one codebase serves all five →
Per platform
What each platform asks of you
- HbbTV app development
- A terminal browser bound by ETSI TS 102 796, no store and no review queue — an application is a URL with the right Content-Type. The oldest competence here, and the one that constrains the other four. HbbTV app development →
- Samsung Tizen app development
- A Chromium-derived runtime, a signed .wgt through Samsung Seller Office, and registerKey in place of a keyset. The review queue decides your release date, not your sprint.
- LG webOS app development
- A Chromium runtime, an .ipk through the LG Content Store, and the Magic Remote — a pointer rather than a d-pad, which is an interaction-design problem before it is a key-mapping one.
- Titan OS app development
- A Chromium runtime on Philips and AOC sets, and an application that is a hosted URL rather than a package — closer to HbbTV than to Tizen in how it is delivered, and unlike HbbTV in that it is listed in a store and goes through QA before it launches.
- Whale OS app development
- An HTML5 browser runtime across a long tail of brands, also delivered as a hosted URL, with a 1280 × 720 surface and an overscan safe area of 1216 × 684 that catches every layout drawn to the full frame.
The seams between them are written out in full: what one codebase shares, and the five things it cannot →
Six kinds
Six kinds of application
- Media libraries
- Catalogue, search, continue-watching, and a player that still behaves on a ten-year-old set. Written out: Bibel TV · ProSiebenSat.1.
- EPG
- Programme data, now and next, themed channels — fed from the broadcaster's own systems rather than maintained twice. Written out: ProSiebenSat.1.
- Livestreaming
- Several simultaneous streams, with a channel change that feels like television rather than like a web player reloading. Written out: Bibel TV, four livestreams.
- Operator apps
- Privileged HbbTV applications that run on the platform itself rather than on a channel — a different technical contract and a different counterpart. We co-built the one on HD+ — what that involves.
- SwitchIn advertising
- Addressable TV advertising on HbbTV: a format that invites a viewer out of the commercial and into the application without losing the commercial. It is the format that makes an HbbTV app pay for itself — how it is built.
- Format landing pages
- Campaign screens for a running show — The Voice of Germany, Germany's Next Topmodel — built to a broadcast schedule rather than a project plan. Why that changes the architecture.
Behind them
The platform behind them
Most of what an editorial team experiences is not the app; it is what feeds it. We build headless Drupal with React frontends, REST and GraphQL, Elasticsearch where search has to be real, automated daily ingest from pre-production systems, and playlist tools the schedulers actually use.
How we work
About eight people in Feldkirchen near Munich. You talk to the managing director, not to an account layer.
One backlog across all platforms. That is where the shared codebase stops being an architecture diagram and becomes something you feel: one release train, one QA pass, one feature request instead of four.
Edges
What we do not do
No conformance certification — we are not a test house. No device certification lab. No broadcast playout. And no single-platform consumer apps, for the reason in the first paragraph.
Clients
Questions
What broadcasters ask first
- Which platforms do you build television applications for?
- HbbTV, Samsung Tizen, LG webOS, Titan OS and Whale OS — from one React codebase with a thin adapter per runtime, rather than four separate builds.
- Will you build for a single platform only?
- Usually not. Below two platforms a shared architecture is overhead you do not need, and almost any web agency can deliver one app on one platform. That is the case where we are the wrong call.
- Do you certify applications or run conformance testing?
- No. No conformance certification, no device certification lab and no broadcast playout. Our HbbTV emulator is a development tool, not a conformance test bench, and it does not prove that an application runs on a real device.
- Where are you, and who would we be talking to?
- About eight people in Feldkirchen near Munich. RedSmart.TV is the television arm of RedOrbit GmbH; you talk to the managing director, not to an account layer.
- Do you build what feeds the application as well?
- Yes — headless Drupal with React frontends, REST and GraphQL, Elasticsearch where search has to be real, automated daily ingest from pre-production systems, and playlist tools for the schedulers.
Tell us what you are building.
Christian answers these himself, usually within a working day.