Amazon TV? The Everything Store Might Soon Broadcast Live
|Amazon, one of the leading streaming video services, is said to be shopping the idea of including live broadcasts in their offerings.
If there’s a company both large and experimental enough to pull this off, there’s no doubt that Amazon could likely give this an earnest try. With Apple TV working to bring live local television broadcasts to their devices in the coming future, it makes sense that Amazon would want to compete on these features. Things heated up this month when Amazon declared they were going to pull Apple TV and Google Chromecast from their online stores citing not wanting to “confuse” customers who might think the devices stream Amazon Prime.
Other services such as Sling TV are already working to making streaming live television more commonplace, but have found themselves up against bandwidth issues during major events. Amazon could likely combat these same problems with massive server offerings preventing as much downtime as possible.
According to Bloomberg, Amazon’s recent acquisition of Elemental Technologies will enable Amazon to quickly ramp up live television streaming technology, via Web, Frost & Sullivan analyst Dan Rayburn.
“Those I have spoken with haven’t disclosed how far along Amazon is with regards to a live OTT service. It’s possible Amazon is simply looking at the economics of the business, which would involve them talking with content owners about costs.” Rayburn said.
The move certainly passes our sniff test. Apple is going to come roaring into live TV here shortly, and Amazon can’t fall behind when it comes to offering more modern television distribution.
Competing on the devices upon which we all stream is SO 2014.