Don't Just Show Up: Trade Show PR Isn't All About Body Count
Publicists who focus on filling senior executive hours with the most meetings are only focused on body count, no matter what it takes.
Home Automation: The Newest Way To Improve Homes
As smartphones started to become more and more prevalent, it was inevitable that people would seek new ways to incorporate them into their lives, including their homes.
Pritzker Group Private Capital Acquires Milestone AV Technologies
Pritzker Group Private Capital announced that it has acquired Milestone for an undisclosed price from The Duchossois Group, which will retain a significant interest in the business and continue to have representatives serve on the board of directors.
Milestone designs, markets and distributes mounting equipment and display solutions for the audiovisual and digital signage markets. Its consumer and commercial products are sold principally under the Chief, Da-Lite and Sanus brands. Milestone serves more than 5,000 global customers, including professional AV dealers, regional home theater dealers, consumer electronics retailers, mass merchants and original equipment manufacturers. The company maintains global operations with offices in the U.S., Europe and China.
"Our acquisition of Milestone demonstrates Pritzker Group Private Capital's strategy of investing in clear market leaders with excellent management teams. We are well aligned with the Duchossois family in the view that our permanent, proprietary capital base allows our management teams to build great businesses over the long term" said Tony Pritzker, managing partner of Pritzker Group Private Capital, Chicago. "Together with the Milestone management team, we have a clear path forward that continues the company's long history of new product innovation, international growth and add-on acquisitions."
OTT Device Shipments Are Booming, Says IHS
Shipments of devices capable of playing over-the-top (OTT) content -- including set-top boxes, Blu-ray players, connected TVs, gaming consoles, and even tablets, smartphones, and desktop computers -- will grow 20 percent in 2013, says business analysis company IHS. Manufacturers shipped 1.43 billion OTT-capable devices in 2012, and will ship 1.7 billion this year. IHS notes that those are enough OTT devices to equip nearly one-quarter of the people on the planet.
IHS says that the OTT device market should grow by another 20 percent next year, as well, heading for 2.67 billion devices shipped in 2017.
While this sounds like a boom for set-top boxes, IHS notes that most of this growth is coming from computers and smartphones. Those two categories account for 836 million of the 1.43 billion OTT-capable devices shipped in 2012. Excluding computers and smartphones shows that 480 million devices will ship this year, which is an increase of 30 percent from 2012.
“Content owners, operators, and consumers all are driving the proliferation of the OTT model,” says Jordan Selburn, senior principal analyst for consumer platforms at IHS.
Building a Sound System for Your Wireless Home
In a world with a glut of options for data transmission, this guide will help you pick the best format to fill your home music, sans speaker wire or vacuum tubes.
For all but the purist vinyl-owning audiophiles, speakers have become wireless extensions of our phones, tablets, and laptops. A few swipes of a glowing screen are typically all you need to link your music library to a speaker. Right now, playing music loudly is cheaper and simpler than ever, but it takes some know-how to identify the best way to spend those hundreds of dollars.
There are several options for wireless formats, and, unfortunately, committing to one generally means eschewing the others. We have witnessed format battles before such as Blu-ray vs. HD DVD or VHS vs. Betamax, in which one emerges dominant. But for years now, wireless audio has yet to present a victor whose ubiquity will please shareholders and relieve confused consumers. Until that happens, it pays to understand the differences between formats such as Bluetooth, AirPlay, and Sonos. All of them have specific benefits and drawbacks that will determine which one is best for rigging your house for wireless music.
Bluetooth: Reliable and Idiot-Proof
AirPlay: Bring Patience and High Fidelity Files
Sonos: Build It
Full Article:
Samsung and LG tipped to unveil flexible OLED TVs at CES 2014
With CES 2014 just around the corner, latest reports have suggested both Samsung and LG will unveil flexible OLED TVs at the Las Vegas-based show.
With both manufacturers having showcased curved OLED televisions during the 2013 rendition of CES, January’s showpiece convention will reportedly see the Korean rivals take things one step further.
It has been suggested that the rumoured flexible screen OLED TVs will feature sizeable curved panels which can have the angle of curvature altered using the unit’s accompanying remote control .
While there are sure to be many who question the necessity of this sort of feature on a television, it has been suggested that the ‘flexible’ and adjustable curve will allow users to angle their TVs to better suit the seating positions of multiple viewers.
Although confirmed details on these futuristic, flexible OLED TVs are still few and far between, it is not believed that the angle of flex will extend beyond just a few degrees.
Read more
Wi-Fi to Hold Over 40% Share of 8 Million Unit Smart Thermostat Market by 2018
The global smart thermostats market is expected to grow from 1.3 million in 2013 to 8 million unit shipments in 2018; a CAGR of 43%. Disruptive innovation in thermostats from new entrants such as Nest Labs, ecobee, and EcoFator has significantly raised the bar for product design and innovation in a device category that had seen little change over several decades.
Smart thermostat global revenues are expected to see fivefold growth to reach $600 million by 2018. Currently, North America is the most lucrative market for smart thermostats, contributing more than half the worldwide total. Driving this region's dominant market share is a tech-savvy population adopting smart mobile devices packed with low-cost wireless sensors, an expanding install base of buildings connected with smart meters, home automation initiatives from Telco's and Cable companies, and a slowly recovering housing market.
Plugaway Is An App-Controlled Plug & LED System Aiming To Undercut The Smart Home Competition
Another contender for smart(en)ing up your home has taken to Kickstarter to raise funds. The Beijing-based startup behind Plugaway has put together Wi-Fi connected plugs and LED lightbulbs which, used in conjunction with its Android or iOS app, can remotely switch your appliances on or off, or dim or kill your lights.
The system can also be used to monitor electricity consumption, schedule and time appliances, and set up device alerts and notifications. Or it will, assuming it hits its Kickstarter goal and transitions from the current prototype stage to commercial product (Plugaway is aiming to ship kit to backers next April). It's very close to making its funding goal at least, with more than $47,500AUD raised of a $50,000AUD target and still 34 days left on their crowdfunding campaign.
Plugaway's aim is to reduce the costs of hooking your old school household appliances into the tap-happy convenience of apps. They're doing this by offering two pieces of kit: smart plugs, so you can plug any appliance in and remotely switch it on or off; and smart LEDs, so you can remotely control lights.
Their Wi-Fi-enabled smart plugs cost $30 a pop - which means Plugaway is undercutting Belkin's WeMo plugs. And their LED lightbulbs are also priced cheaper than LIFX's similar kit (which starts at just under $90 a pop – or will when it goes on general sale in retail stores in January).
Hunters: A Good Patent is Good, a Great Lawyer is Even Better
There has to be some way to separate the wheat from the chaff, the frivilous/worthless lawsuits from the honest patents based on hard, sweaty creative efforts that deserve protection.
Flying Without Navigation
Or how we learned to stop worrying and love the research bomb*
CES 2014 News Report
News and Product Announcement from the show.
Nostalgia - HomeToys December 2000
Here is our December 2000 eMagazine issue - bear with us on some of the broken links but you may find the articles interesting --- some even relevant.
Revolv Raises $4M for 'Universal Remote' to Control Smart Homes
Smart-home technologies that control lights, thermostats, the locks on doors and more were sold as futuristic luxuries just a few years ago. Now, they are proliferating and entering the mainstream market at more affordable prices.
A Boulder, Colo., startup called Revolv raised $4 million in seed financing to become the “universal remote,” or gateway, that homeowners can use to control them all.
Foundry Group led the round, joined by American Family Insurance and other angel investors.
The company is the third smart-home device maker to score institutional capital within the past two weeks: August Home Inc. raised $8 million led by Maveron for Bluetooth-controlled locks, and Quirky Inc. raised $79 million from investors including General Electric to make more “connected-home” gadgets.
A spate of other smart home tech ventures–such as Ambient Devices, Doorbot, Dropcam, Nest Labs, Sonos and SmartThings– raised seed and venture capital earlier. Other smart home tech businesses have turned to crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter, IndieGogo and Dragon Innovation for nondilutive capital.
Build a Cheap Home Automation System in 10 Minutes with Ninja Blocks
Home security and automation are rarely mentioned in the same sentence as the word cheap, but it's totally possible if you're willing to do a few things yourself. We checked out a $200 DIY kit called Ninja Blocks, and were able to get a home automation and security system up and running in about 10 minutes.P
What You'll Get
Ninja Blocks are an open-source home automation system that allow you to connect a variety of sensors to the internet. Ninja Blocks are essentially the brain behind that home automation system, and you can connect sensors and peripherals to it easily. Basically, Ninja Blocks are kind of an If This Then That for the physical world. In a way, they're similar to the Belkin W eMo , but Ninja Blocks have a lot more options for triggers, and support the WeMo if you already have one.
Once everything is set up, all your gadgets and home monitors will be connected to the internet and visible from your smartphone or PC. You'll be able to monitor the temperature in your home, turn on lights, check out web cams, toggle motion sensors, and pretty much anything else you can think of in regards to home security or automation. If you have anything with a sensor, actuator, or gadget that uses RF signals or Wi-Fi, chances are that you can connect it to a Ninja Block. You can even add to it with your own Arduino, Raspberry Pi, or BeagleBone projects.P
Home Automation Startup August Raises $8 Million From Maveron To Make Smart Locks Mainstream
Home automation startup August is getting ready to start shipping its first product to consumers early next year. But first, it’s raised a bit more cash to add personnel and ramp up production of its mobile-operated smart lock.
August raised $8 million in a funding round led by Maveron, with participation from Cowboy Ventures, Industry Ventures, Rho Ventures, and SoftTech VC. The new round brings total funding raised to $10 million, and previous investors include Matt Mullenweg, Mark Pincus, David Dolby, and Scott Belsky, among others. Along with the funding, Maveron partner David Wu will be joining August’s board of directors.
Bringing Maveron on board makes sense, as the VC firm focuses exclusively on consumer-facing companies, with other investments such as eBay, Zulily, Groupon, and Shutterfly. Wu, who joined Maveron in 2012, had personally invested in companies like Practice Fusion, Sociable Labs, Postmates, Beautylish, and Taulia, and sites on the board of Line2 and SeatMe.
With the new funding, August is getting ready to start shipping its first product, the August Smart Lock. The lock, which was designed by Yves Behar, enables homeowners and renters to access their homes or send virtual keys to others via mobile app. The August smart lock uses Bluetooth technology to enable users to automatically unlock a door when they are nearby, and it also has a feature called Everlock that can automatically lock a door behind you.
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Featured Product
IntraSonic Technology - I2000 Music Distribution and Intercom System
Get wired for sound throughout your home with a new state-of-the-art communications and entertainment system! The I2000 Music Distribution and Intercom Systems provide a wide variety of features at an affordable price so you can enjoy the luxury of music throughout every room in your home without moving a muscle.
Interested in wireless music streaming? See our optional Bluetooth Receiver
