With the deluge of Internet-connected TVs and consumer-facing set-top boxes hitting the market, not to mention the soon-to-launch YouView IPTV platform in the U.K., it seems inevitable that sometimes kludgy and niche PC-to-TV solutions will continue to be squeezed. Why involve a PC for getting Internet video onto the television, if it’s not necessary.
But that not stopping a whole host of VCs pumping a further $6 million in to Veebeam, which offers a wireless USB streaming solution for getting content from a PC to the TV. The funding round was led by Amadeus Capital Partners, Intel Capital and Oak Investment Partners, reports paidContent. Bay Partners, Formative Ventures, Khosla Ventures and Vision Capital also participated.
Veebeam was founded in 2008 through a merger of Staccato Communications (San Diego, CA) and Artimi (Cambridge, UK), and is thought to have previously raised $20 million in equity funding during the merger, with Staccato reportedly having already raised $77.5 million. That’s a lot of cash, although hardware startups don’t run cheap.
Veebeam’s $99/£99 USB dongle and wireless transmitter/receiver means that anything that can be viewed on a laptop can be sent to a television, so in that sense it’s more versatile than dedicated Internet TV services but the experience is also less eloquent. As those Internet-connected TV services gain more content and penetration, one would hope that we can cut the cord so to speak from the PC altogether. At which point I’m not sure where that leaves Veebeam.