Dankner Investments, holders of a controlling interest in Matav, today signed a letter of intent agreement with Microsoft Israel for marketing WEB-TV technology (television Internet transmission). The joint venture covered by the agreement will be a partnership between Dankner, Matav, and other unspecified parties. It will engage in distribution and operation of WEB-TV in the Israeli market. Microsoft will not be a capital partner, but will supply technological know how.
The venture will market and install television services to cable companies, convertors to subscribers, and will engage in developing appropriate content. Dankner Investments told "Globes" that the service will be combined with Internet services through cables operated by Matav, and that it intends to market the services to other cable companies, "and to any other party in the communications market who wants, including Bezeq and DBS".
The new service is another way of providing Internet access, competing with Internet Gold's access services. Microsoft has signed an agreement with Internet Gold to develop a Hebrew Internet search engine.
WEB-TV is a technology, which is installed in a television convertor and which facilitates sending e-mail through television, surfing the Internet, active participation in TV games, quizzes, and surveys, chatting with other viewers, easy programming of videos for recording, receiving program lists through television, etc. All this is through remote control and a wireless keyboard.
The technology allows the use of any television, while requiring connection with the telephone. At the same time, this use does not prevent the receipt of incoming phone calls, since the technology allows incoming calls to enter by "waiting call", while the user is connected to the Internet.
WEB-TV, which was founded in 1995, was swallowed in 1997 by Microsoft for $425 million in cash.
Published by Israel's Business Arena on November 1, 1999