Strategy in TECH...
CEDIA announced last week that it has hired Vincent Bruno to take over as CEDIA’s new Chief Executive Officer, effective next month. Bruno will leave his current position as Marketing Director for manufacturer Crestron Electronics, a position he’s held for seven years, to take the CEO role at the top trade association for integrators.
Wireless multi-room automation system maker Turn It On (TiO), a division of Anuva Automation, announced this week that it will be sponsoring a fun competition at next month’s CEDIA Expo called the Ninja Time Trials. The Ninja Time Trials offer an opportunity for Expo attendees to compete against the clock and each other, with each day’s winner awarded a full TiO home automation system with a retail value of $5,000.
The legal war between Sonos, Inc. and D&M Holdings, Inc. is really just getting started and already D&M Holdings has lost its first major battle – with U.S. District Judge Richard G. Andrews denying their motion to disqualify the attorneys representing Sonos. The matter, a patent infringement case filed by Sonos in late 2014 against D&M Holdings, Inc. dba The D+M Group, D&M Holdings U.S. Inc., and Denon Electronics (USA), LLC (D&M), is related to D&M’s HEOS line of wireless music systems.
Who says you can’t go home again? Core Brands announced this week that Jason Dominique has rejoined the company to take the role of National Sales Manager of the Security Channel. Dominique previously worked for Core Brands’ Proficient line from 2005 to 2013.
Sharp Corp. announced this week that it will begin to ship 8K ultra high-definition flat panel TVs and monitors by the end of October. Initially, sales are targeted at certain industrial and commercial markets – with the company saying the very first shipments are headed for broadcast stations and movie studios. This is the first step in commercializing the technology that the company has been working on for years now.
UPDATE – See correction below storyRosewater Energy Group announced this week that it completed the first installation of their residential energy hub in the showroom of South Florida integrator Boca Theater and Automation in Boca Raton, Florida. The installation was completed at the end of August and it features the latest version of Rosewater’s hub with nano-carbon battery technology.
Bowers & Wilkins (B&W) announced Wednesday that it has completely re-engineered their top-of-the-line 800 Series Diamond loudspeaker line, a favorite of many discerning audiophiles. Changing your flagship product is an incredibly daunting (and risky) task – how do you improve on perfection? – but it’s all in a day’s work for a company that, since 1966, has been in a “Quest for Perfection.”
On Monday, Toshiba released their twice-delayed final financial data for the last fiscal year (ended March 2015) in what it undoubtedly hoped would be the first step to turning the page from a scandal-racked year. But forces out of their control conspire to keep them in the hot seat – with a regulatory agency threatening large fines and a major shareholder demanding the company sue its former executives.
Apple, Inc. held their regularly scheduled September event today to announce new products – this time to introduce: a minor new Watch update, a more significant new bigger iPad they call the iPad Pro, a new Apple TV with a revamped user interface, and finally the new interim smartphone update – the iPhone 6s & 6s Plus. Using lots of exciting & cool music, dramatic video segments, and massive colorful images on a huge screen – presenters worked hard to milk applause from the Apple friendly crowd. But for us, most of these “innovations” were “meh” – more evolutionary than revolutionary.
We recently had the sad duty to report on the passing of our colleague and good friend Len Schneider, just last month. At the time of that report, we had no information on a service in his honor – although many of you contacted us to ask about one. Len’s family has now set the details for a service to be held in his memory in New Jersey on Saturday, October 3, 2015.
