LG is set to breathe new life into the webOS platform after the company announced today that it has acquired the software and its intellectual property from HP.
The news, which was first noted by CNET, comes after HP abandoned webOS device and software development in August 2011, then open-sourced the platform so that developers might be able to salvage something from the software that was widely acclaimed, despite the lack of smartphone and tablet sales which it powered.
LG now claims complete ownership of the webOS source code, its documentation and webOS websites. It has obtained HP licenses, as well as the patents that Palm transferred to its owner when it was acquired in 2010.
LG will embed webOS in its new smart TVs, perhaps giving it a more connected edge over Samsung and its rivals. The company launched its first connected TVs in 2007, iterating them to include apps, gestures and other technologies to bridge the gap between the television and the second screen.
Skott Ahn, president and CFO of LG Electronics said: “It creates a new path for LG to offer an intuitive user experience and Internet services across a range of consumer electronics devices.”
LG will bring the webOS to its new Silicon Valley labs in Sunnyvale and San Francisco, teaming-up with LG’s other teams in the US.
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