Telegent Systems, a small Silicon Valley-based semiconductor company, is betting that old-fashioned free-to-air analogue television broadcasting could hold the key to driving the adoption of TV in mobile phones in many large markets, including China.

While most of the world’s biggest telecoms equipment companies and network operators are battling over which digital technology standard will become dominant, Telegent has developed a semiconductor chip that, when built into mobile phones, enables them to receive existing live analogue broadcasts.