Erik Huggers on Intel's TV Plans

Since this year’s CES show in early January, Intel has been receiving a lot of press on it's up and coming Web TV service. In a recent conversation with Peter Kafka and Walt Mossberg at D: Dive Into Media, corporate VP of Intel Media Erik Huggers tried to make the case that yes, the hardware company can make a compelling case to market Web TV to consumers. Can they succeed where other industry giants like Apple and Google have not? Hugger's admits that it's an uphill battle. The Intel service will require consumers to purchase a new box (the name of which is yet to be announced), which is necessary to deliver what he deems “the full experience” that the company wants. "I think we can bring an incredible television experience via the Internet to consumers,” Huggers said. “What this is not about... is a value play.” Don't expect them to offer “a la carte” programming, either. In other words, expect bundles of programming like those offered with other major TV packages. But Huggers’s pitch is for a better bundle, smarter and more well-curated. “If bundles are bundled right … I think there is real value in that,” he said.
No doubt Intel’s most difficult sell with this new product/service will be with the integrated camera. According to Hugger, it watches your movements and TV viewing habits with the aim of personalizing the way your each member of the household watches television (not to mention it’s ability to highly target advertisements). Ultimately, he said, being able to identify an individual TV viewer will provide a better overall user experience. So in a nutshell, Huggers wants you to buy a great-looking box with a superior UI and potentially personalized content streams for roughly the same or more than you currently pay. From my perspective that’s going to be a difficult pitch, to say the least. Over the past five years I've worked with the majority of companies that are trying to carve out a share of this space. This is definitely one to keep an eye on. More on this to come!

See the interview on Aol: http://on.aol.com/video/erik-huggers-talks-up-intels-web-tv-service-517670867