HP sells webOS to LG for smart TVs

Life

Hewlett-Packard has sold some of the rights to its webOS mobile operating system to LG Electronics for use in smart TVs made by the South Korean electronics firm.

LG has agreed to acquire the source code, webOS engineering team and other assets from HP, in a deal announced Monday. LG will also license HP patents related to webOS and cloud technology, the companies said.

Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.

HP acquired the mobile operating system, along with device maker Palm, in February 2010. HP used the OS on its short-lived TouchPad device, which debuted in mid-2011 then disappeared weeks later.

HP announced a new tablet, the $169 Slate 7, on Sunday at Mobile World Congress. The Slate 7 will run the Android operating system.

LG will lead the Open webOS and Enyo open source projects as part of the deal, the company said. HP will retain ownership of all of Palm’s cloud computing assets, including source code, talent, infrastructure and contracts.

HP said it will also continue to support Palm users.

LG will use the technology to expand the Web capabilities of its smart TVs, said Sam Chang, LG vice president and general manager of innovation and Smart TV, in an interview.

Chang said LG bought the webOS assets in part for the engineering team, which includes user experience engineers.

But LG was also after the webOS software itself, which was built from the ground up for the Web and has strong multitasking capabilities, Chang said. LG also likes the webOS ‘card’ interface design, he said, which makes it easy to flip through apps on a screen.

As for how LG plans to implement webOS, Chang wasn’t saying. "We’re looking forward to demonstrating products very quickly, but I’m not in the habit of announcing things to my competitors in advance," he said.

LG will continue to offer TVs based on Google’s TV software. "Google TV delivers a great experience for the consumer looking for a very search-based, lean forward experience," Chang said.

LG’s Silicon Valley labs report into LG’s corporate technology organisation, implying webOS could find its way into other LG products. But in the near term the focus will be TVs.

IDG News Service

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