ActiveVideo Network's CloudTV H5 links up with Siri, brings voice control to set-top boxes

So you ignored the same old design and moderately bumped specs, plunked down your plastic and picked up an iPhone 4S -- presumably on the allure of Siri. Well, that bodiless, digital lady helper's about to work her concierge magic on your cable TV. ActiveVideo Networks plans to demo an implementation of its CloudTV H5 apps platform -- including iVOD, amongst others -- to bring voice navigation to living rooms via your set-top box. After routing a user's requests over a cellular network, the company's servers do the heavy lifting and deliver the intended content and search results all supposedly in the time it would take to use a remote control. We'll be sure to get some up close and personal time with this voice-based interface at CES this week and let you know how it all pans out.

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ActiveVideo Demos Voice-Controlled TV Navigation for Cable: New CloudTV H5 Capability to be Shown at CES

SAN JOSE, Calif., Jan. 6, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- ActiveVideo Networks™, creators of CloudTV™, the cloud-based app platform for television, today announced that it will demonstrate voice-controlled television navigation at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show next week.

The ActiveVideo demo will show the speed and flexibility with which the CloudTV H5™ application platform can power compelling new navigation experiences for multichannel video service providers. In the demo, the CloudTV H5 platform is used in tandem with devices that support the Siri personal assistant application from Apple to bring voice control navigation through any digital set-top box or connected device. For example, viewers could request that the platform "show all of the 'Harry Potter' movies," or "show all of the movies with Brad Pitt."

ActiveVideo Networks will be showing advanced navigation interfaces, such as iVOD, and other applications on the CloudTV H5 platform in its suite at the Renaissance Las Vegas Hotel during CES 2012 January 10-13.

"Voice-controlled navigation through any digital set-top box is one of those experiences that only CloudTV can enable," said Jeff Miller, president and CEO of ActiveVideo Networks. "And while voice control itself is innovative, what's most important is how the interoperability of cloud-based processing can dramatically transform the way viewers control and engage with their televisions, and can lead to a new generation of television services that is limited only by our imaginations."

The ActiveVideo demo shows how voice control combined with ActiveVideo's cloud-based processing enables voice-activated content selection, search and discovery on any digital set-top box – even legacy STBs. Voice commands are transmitted through the cellular network to CloudTV servers, which respond to the input by delivering specific video and applications as a personalized, adaptive video stream to the set-top box or connected device. The time required for the entire transaction is consistent with that of standard remote controls.

Designed to interface seamlessly with existing cable operator network infrastructure, the CloudTV H5 platform executes and renders the complete application in the cloud. The application is delivered as a personalized, adaptive video stream to the set-top box or connected device, which simply passes remote control key clicks or keypad entries back through the network to the cloud with very low latency. The CloudTV platform, including this capability, can be completely deployed without changing or adding a single device in the home, thus achieving unparalleled service velocity. CloudTV is approaching nearly 10 million screens in the United States and abroad with Cablevision Systems, Oceanic Time Warner Cable and other operators, as well as on Philips-brand TVs.