In software development, frameworks have become the backbone of how teams build apps. The landscape is dominated by names like React, React Native, and Flutter, but integrating these tools into larger development teams isn’t always straightforward. As a result, a wave of fully fledged SaaS platforms - such as Expo for React Native, FlutterFlow for Flutter or Codemagic for both – has emerged to streamline everything from building to testing to publishing. Developers have grown used to this kind of speed and simplicity.
Until now, however, the TV app world has not had an equivalent. Teams building for Android TV, Samsung Tizen, LG webOS, or Apple TV still juggle fragmented tools, native SDKs, and slow, manual workflows. That's why Wiztivi created Dana, our cross-platform TV app framework that we’ve used internally for more than a decade to power premium apps for operators and broadcasters. Unlike mobile-first and web-first frameworks like React or Flutter, Dana has been built specifically for TV apps. As more customers asked for direct access to Dana for their own development teams – not just the high-quality video apps that our engineers were building with Dana — we saw a clear opportunity.
Inspired by the evolution we’ve seen in the mobile world, we began transforming Dana from an internal framework into a full SaaS platform that gives TV app developers the same kind of streamlined, collaborative environment developers elsewhere already enjoy. Today, the Dana SaaS platform is being tested in closed beta by a select group of experienced developers. It’s already been used to create about ten video apps for Smart TVs and other big-screen devices and will be available in open beta soon.
In this post, we’ll take you inside that evolution: the business case behind the move, what the new platform unlocks for development teams, and why this shift brings something genuinely new to the TV app ecosystem.
Here is your first look at the Dana platform:
Dana began life as a pure framework: a robust set of tools, libraries, and APIs enabling developers to build high-performance TV apps locally on their machines. This framework has long been the technical foundation of Wiztivi’s own multiscreen apps. The new SaaS platform builds on that foundation rather than replacing it. Developers still download Dana’s trusted components and code locally, but the platform adds an entirely new layer of capabilities:
In other words, the framework remains the toolbox. The SaaS platform is the workshop built around it — bringing order, automation, and visibility to the entire lifecycle of all your multiscreen TV apps.
As we expanded Dana’s adoption internally and began exploring external access, several needs became impossible to ignore – adding up to a strong business case for evolving Dana beyond the framework level into a full TV app platform.
Many of the organisations interested in Dana operate multi-disciplinary teams: developers, testers, product owners, and release managers. They need a shared environment, not just code. The SaaS platform allows non-developers to participate meaningfully in the development cycle. Project managers can track build progress, QA can pull release candidates, and technical leads can review logs without touching code.
Teams told us they needed clearer insight into:
These operational insights help cross-functional teams work more efficiently for faster time to market and lower costs.
Here’s an example of how you can view these statistics in the Dana dashboards:
Opening the Dana Framework up to external developers for the first time in its 10+ years is exciting, but it has to be done securely. Using the SaaS platform, rather than via raw code packages, ensures consistency, reliability, and manageable onboarding for external developer teams.
Developers continue to work on their own machines using the Dana framework, but the platform changes everything about what happens next.
Through the platform, developers can:
The platform processes builds in the cloud, returning downloadable packages ready for submission. In the future, you’ll be able to publish apps directly from the platform to app stores like Google Play or Apple. Take a look at how it works:
Local machine differences and configuration drift have always been a risk in multiscreen builds. The platform removes this variability by standardising builds across a controlled environment.
Because builds run in the cloud, developers aren’t blocked by long compilation times on their own machines. The platform also offers a preview feature that allows teams to see their app in the browser — a fast way to verify UI changes before starting a full build.
One of the biggest changes introduced by the new platform is that it brings the entire development team together in one place.
This shared-access model removes friction and enables faster iteration across the whole team — not just the developers who are writing code.
Here’s how you can manage workspaces and users to control access in the platform:
After an open beta phase to gather more user feedback, we expect to launch the platform with a number of subscription options, including a freemium tier. This will offer limited build volume and usage — ideal for experimentation or evaluating the workflow before committing to a paid plan.
More details will be shared closer to launch, but the direction is clear: Dana is evolving into a full TV app platform accessible directly to the teams who need it.
If you’d like to be among the first to get your hands on Dana, contact our team to register your interest in the beta program. You can also learn more about Dana on our dedicated website. Or download our checklist to see how Dana stacks up against other frameworks like React and Flutter.