Rapid growth in the number of TVs connected to the Internet has been predicted by London based Digital TV Research, rising from 124 million at the end of 2010 to 551 million by 2016. A growing proportion of these will be directly connected, with strong growth also in those attached via games consoles, and those connected via pay TV set top boxes. The other two main methods of connection, blu-ray and retail set top boxes, will grow more slowly.
The report indicated sales of connected TV sets with a built-in Ethernet connection and, increasingly, widgets or applications, was now taking off as retail prices start to fall, but with wide regional variations.
