Amazon has reportedly tasked Lab126, the hardware team responsible for the Kindle e-readers and Echo speakers, with creating a television set based on its existing Fire TV platform.
Insider reported that Amazon wants to release branded TVs as early as this year. The first models to feature the company’s branding won’t have been designed in-house, though. Instead they were said to have been created in partnership with third-party companies such as TCL.
Amazon’s current TV offerings include the Fire TV Cube set-top box, Fire TV Stick dongles, and television sets made by other companies that rely on the Fire TV software. Now it seems the company is preparing to make a bigger commitment to the category than it has to date.
Engadget noted that Amazon started to sell TVs featuring the AmazonBasics branding in India last year, so there is some precedence for the company applying its brand to television sets. Dropping the Basics—and having Lab126 design a TV—would be a continuation of those efforts.
Insider also said that Lab126 and the Amazon Devices team have been working on this new TV for two years. Precious little else is known about the device, however, including how it’s going to differentiate itself from other television sets that use the company’s Fire TV software.
