Apple Smart TV Rumored to Be In the Works

Rumors are once again circulating that Apple is working on a television set. This information is definitely set in the realm of speculation, and it isn’t the first time we’ve seen it crop up, but with each passing day this is beginning to seem inevitable that Apple is coming to our family rooms in a big way.

According a report from AppleInsider, Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty announced in a statement to investors on Friday that supply chain vendors have indicated that Apple is working on some form of Smart TV prototype.  Not much information was available beyond the rumors of the prototype, but Ms. Huberty did speculate that the ultimate reason for Apple to do this would be seeing it combine “TV/Video content, gaming, DVR, as well as other features like apps and FaceTime into one product.”

While this rumor seems to pop up every so often, nothing has ever come of it, but Ms. Stanely raises some very interesting pointsin  her speculation that this would be a convergence device for multiple different Apple products.  Imagine a television controlled by your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad which you could then wirelessly stream media between the two.  Perhaps the TV would be able to stream your cable signal to your iPad meaning you could also walk around the house watching your shows wherever you like within your home.

Expanding the iDevice connections further, say your Apple Smart TV is running iOS, you could then use FaceTime to show off your couch full of people to friends and family.  Since it could possibly run iOS, that’s just that many more apps sold, and a further expansion of the Apple brand.  We’ve already seen games like Scrabble on the iPad use iPhones to help play the game, now imagine the same technology being expanded to a television set where you can use other iOS devices as gaming remotes for driving games.  The Apple ecosystem again grows, and the company once again gets to increase its brand.

If you’re curious as to why Apple would be willing to go down this route, apparently every one percent of the TV set market captured by Apple would mean an additional $4 billion in revenue for the company.  Considering the company is already on track for more record growth, an expansion to more high end products that could also help grow its existing product lines makes perfect sense.  It seems to us that Apple releasing a TV product line isn’t so much a question of “if”, but more one of “when”.

While this is still just a rumor, it looks like we’d all better get ready for the inevitable day where we walk into an Apple store and see a sleek, white and chrome Apple television set.  Even though we’ve gone through this particular rumor before, something feels different about it this time, and it seems unlikely we’ll see this product this year, but 2012 doesn’t seem out of the question at all.

What do you think?  Do you have any interest in a possible Apple Smart TV?

[via AppleInsider]