Titan OS launches as new European smart TV offering with Philips as anchor client

Source: Titan OS

Titan OS, a new technology, entertainment, and advertising company co-founded by ex-Rakuten TV CEO and Wuaki.tv and Love TV Channels co-founder Jacinto Roca, has launched what it describes as an independent European operating system for smart TVs.

The company is also debuting its Titan advertising division to help advertisers reach more relevant audiences.

Barcelona-based Titan OS will initially target the European and Latin American markets, with a contract to supply Philips and AOC TVs in both markets, along with JVC-branded TVs from retailer Currys in the UK.

The company was founded by a team of industry executives from the European and American entertainment, media, and investment sectors, including Disney, Roku, Rakuten TV, and KKR.

In addition to its HQ in Barcelona, Titan will expand its global presence with additional offices in Amsterdam and Taipei.

Jacinto Roca

Speaking exclusively to DTVE ahead of the launch, Roca said that Titan would focus on the European and Latin American markets this year before rolling out more widely in 2025.

“We will licence our OS to brands that do not have their own OS, which is about 40% of the market,” said Roca, who said that Titan would operate a revenue-share model from advertising with participating TV brands.

“The main difference between us and global OS players is that we will share the business with the TV brand. This gives them the chance to generate their own revenue stream over and beyond their hardware margin,” he said. “Our other main difference is that we are European-focused.”

The launch of Titan OS puts the company in competition notably with Xperi-owned TiVo, which launched its own independent smart TV OS last year.

Roca said the pair are effectively “frenemies”, competing in the OS arena while cooperating in the advertising business.

“We collaborate on the Titan Ads side. On the OS side we are competitors,” he said.

Roca said that Titan OS’s relationship with TV Vision, which markets Philips-branded TVs in Europe and Latin America, gave it a strong start, as Philips is the number three brand in these markets.

Roca said the company had a goal to reach 15 million active users over the next couple of years, giving it scale.

“The idea is to become an alternative to the global OS players from the US and Asia,” he said.

Advertising play

Tim Edwards

Titan OS will lean on the company’s expertise in advertising to deliver additional revenues to participating players.

“One of the key things that has happened is that TV consumption has changed over the last few years. It has become difficult for advertisers to reach the right audience. There are a lot of streaming [consumers] who are unreachable via traditional TV and we will enable advertisers to reach those streamers,” said Tim Edwards, COO and co-founder of Titan OS and, like Roca, an alumnus of Rakuten TV.

Edwards said that Titan OS would enable improved content discovery on smart TVs by developing AI-based personalization of the home page to surface relevant content from different streaming apps. The company is leaning on automatic content recognition (ACR) data to enable this level of personalization.

Edwards said the OS would also show its strength in enabling linear channel discovery, particularly around the emerging FAST landscape.

“When you tune in to FAST you will see the most relevant channels and this will provide an interesting opportunity for advertisers,” he said.

Edwards said that while streaming apps were guarded about maintaining control of user data, they were happy to share metadata to enable better surfacing of relevant content.