They are calling it a "friendly management buy-out." tvONE, supplier of high performance video processing equipment, secures a management buyout of the company from Nortek, Inc.

The acquisition was completed July 31, 2015, with a new board of directors comprised of the tvONE management team; David Van Horn, David Reynaga and Andy Fliss, with continued active involvement of Frithjof Becker and Richard Mallett.

"We are extremely excited about independently driving the future of the company," says Andy Fliss, Vice President, Sales and Marketing. "This management group intimately knows and cares about our co-workers. And we are prepared to solidify tvONE's philosophical principles and chart a company business plan geared for growth and success."

tvONE CTO, David Reynaga, adds, "We have the right building blocks and passion to deliver memorable customer experiences though innovative products and, we are absolutely committed to providing unrivaled service and support."

The company expects to operate smoothly through the transition with no changes in customer-related activity. David Van Horn, tvONE CFO, comments, "The friendly MBO arrangement with Nortek has put tvONE in an excellent position to continue growth and success into the future."

The "friendly buyout" is in contrast with an unfriendly buyout... companies that are raking in high profits generally don't get to walk out the door of a holding company. The only reason for a "friendly buyout" is that the holding company is not losing a valuable asset.  In the case of Nortek, with Gefen being pulled into Core Brands about the same time... it would seem that Nortek figures it has nothing lose (and something to gain) by letting a MBO go through. For example, does the friendly MBO include future payments based on sales turnover to Nortek that might turn previous losses (by Nortek corporate accounting that might include corporate allocations and management fees) into a positive contribution?

This commentary doesn't take anything away from the courage (and perhaps even the business acumen) of the new tvONE board. The world is filled with companies that have no value to a conglomerate but after a buyout start putting gold in the pockets of entrepreneurs. Often a company can be more responsive to customers in a flatter management process. In this case, that certainly seems like this is the intention-- and that's good news for distributors and integrators.

Go tvONE Exits Nortek

"A successful digital media solution accounts for more than what you can see on the surface," says Convergent. "It’s what we consider the "The Digital Media Iceberg..."

Solutions are getting more complex, not less. Convergent argues all the attention is given "to things like content and bezel-less screens" which leads users into making mistakes with their enterprise networks and the infrastrure that drives effective digital signage, the modern digital signage that encompasses so much more digital media than the "signage" of even 5 years ago.

A Ballantyne Strong Inc. company, for 35 years they’ve been working with clients to transform the customer experience and enhance the communication across employee channels. Convergent want to challenge customers to think differently about how to engage with their customers and employees-- and the technology they use to do it.

With the addition of new technology (just take, for example, mobile and Big Data and iBeacons), digital "signage" just doesn't encompass what can be achieved. 

Convergent describe the industry as a Digital Media Iceberg with three key tiers:

1. The Really Sexy Stuff
2. The Pretty Cool Stuff
3. The Geeky Stuff...(that if you don't think about your project will fail)

You'll have to download the free white paper to see their full infographic, but an iceberg may be the perfect metaphor to illustrate the different aspects that makeup today's state-of-the-art complete digital signage solution.

And if your client and their "ship-of-state" ignore this iceberg, the mistake will only be... titanic.

Go The Digital Media Iceberg

ONELAN has opened the new demonstration suite at its UK headquarters in Henley-on-Thames to showcase its full range of digital signage players and vertical market applications, including the new Reserva room booking system.

ONELAN's 4K expertise and experience is evident with an NEC 2×2 video wall with 4K loop-through, along with a 4K windmill configuration video wall which is driven by a combination of ONELAN / Datapath technologies.

The demonstration area is comprised of collaborative solutions with trusted partners, such as: Datapath, onemedia, NEC, LG, Samsung, Jansen, Peerless, and Realisation.

Go ONELAN Opens Demo Suite at HQ

Extron Electronics opens a product demonstration and training facility in Stockholm.

The new regional office will provide convenient access to Extron for customers in the Nordics. The new office will be a fully equipped, state-of-the-art training facility for showcasing and demonstrating the latest in Extron technologies and solutions. The office will be staffed by a dedicated technical and sales team, and will include meeting space, a training room, and a product demonstration lab.

Jérôme Guéras, VP EMEA says, "The new facility will allow customers to see working demonstrations of the newest Extron products, learn about AV technologies, and participate in certification courses closer to where they work and live."

The Stockholm office will be staffed by Extron S3 Institute experts and feature a familiar variety of Extron training choices, including hands-on training using real-world scenarios and courses to pursue various Extron Certifications. The first Extron training in the new facility is scheduled for October 6 and 7.

Other Extron regional training facilities in EMEA are located in the UK, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Tel Aviv, Russia, South Africa, and Dubai.

Go Extron Opens Product Demo & Training Facility in Stockholm

The global digital signage market is projected to reach $23.76 Billion by 2020, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.18% between 2015 and 2020. 

The same report says the European Digital Signage Market is expected to reach $7.03 Billion by 2020 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.84%.

This is from the latest report by MarketsandMarkets, a global market research and consulting company.

In Europe, the retail and hospitality sectors are expected to be the major applications boosting the growth of this market. 

According to the report authors, the demand for distribution and scheduling software has increased considerably over the past few years, mainly due to its ability to support activities such as creation, distribution, and scheduling, and displaying content for the LCD, LED, and OLED displays installed across the commercial, infrastructure, institutional, and industrial applications. It allows the users access to distribute and schedule programs over a large network or on a USB flash drive, and to select the software version as per their requirement, business environment, and the existing systems. 

Content management system is a major type of software in the digital signage market: it is expected to grow at a CAGR of 9.30% between 2015 and 2020. It facilitates the creation and management of the various types of information sent to digital signage displays. It is used for more sophisticated signage content and better ease of use. It also enables employees or students to  add content without gaining higher levels of administrative control over content. This system is used in all applications, as content is main aspect.

North America holds the major market share for digital signage market followed by Europe and APAC. APAC is expected to grow at the highest CAGR of 9.34% between 2015 and 2020, and reach $6.91 billion by 2020. 

The report refers to a number of players in the market who provide a wide variety of digital signage solutions and other allied solutions such as NEC Display Solutions (Japan), Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (South Korea), LG Display Co., Ltd (South Korea), Sharp Corporation (Japan), Sony Corporation (Japan), Panasonic Corporation (Japan), AU Optronics Corp. (Taiwan.), Planar Systems, Inc. (U.S.), Adflow Networks (Canada), and Omnivex Corporation (Canada).

Go MarketsandMarkets

Integrated Systems Events, the company that produces the ISE exhibition, enters into a joint venture agreement with invidis consulting to take a majority share in its annual Digital Signage Conference.

The Digital Signage Conference, run in cooperation with trade association OVAB Europe, is taking place this year on 14-15 September at the Hilton Airport Hotel, Munich.

It will feature a mix of presentations and workshops on digital signage and DooH technology and business topics.

Invidis, a research and communications business specialising in digital signage and Digital-out of-Home (DooH), launched the Digital Signage Conference in 2007. Invidis has been a regular ISE partner in recent years and has run several successful digital signage programmes and installation tours around the exhibition.

Integrated Systems Europe is Europe’s largest trade show for AV and systems integration and is the largest digital signage exhibition in the world, with 446 digital signage relevant exhibitors at ISE 2015. It is co-owned by InfoComm International and CEDIA.

Photo: Left, Terry Friesenborg (Infocomm), Florian Rotberg (Invidis Consulting) and Mike Blackman (Integrated Systems Events) Image: Invidis

ISE Managing Director Mike Blackman comments: “invidis consulting is recognised as a leading expert in the provision of content and analysis of the digital signage marketplace while ISE excels at AV event management. There will be many synergies and growth opportunities to come from this move and it further demonstrates ISE’s ambition to be at the forefront of providing market intelligence and thought leadership in the sectors in which it operates.”

He continued, “For existing clients of invidis consulting it will be ‘business as usual'. All of the existing staff and management team that work on the conference will remain in place.” 

Florian Rotberg, invidis consulting Managing Director, adds “The Digital Signage Conference in Munich has increasingly become a European event in the last years. There are more and more international projects in the market and on the other hand the industry in Germany can learn a lot from other countries. Teaming up with ISE to build on our current position and to develop the conference brand internationally represents the perfect partnership. Now we can offer our exhibitors and visitors an even more successful conference.”

Go 8th Munich Conference on Digital Signage

Take two on the hottest trends in digital signage—4K and video walls—put them together and you’ve got ONELAN’s solution that combines a 4K player with a video wall solution.

Their simple, cost effective communication solution, designed to create a high impact visual experience with Ultra High 4K definition, will be on show at their stand at ISE 2015.

To create a video wall using the ONELAN Net-Top-Box (NTB), there are two approaches.  A first approach uses the displays’ built in loop-through capability and a second approach uses a single 4K NTB with a video wall controller from their partner Datapath.

Using the ONELAN 4K player and the Datapath video wall controller, you can break away from the traditional video wall layout. ONELAN says “…your imagination is the only limit with ever more creative video wall arrangements.” And the market for more creative video wall arrangements certainly is growing.

Russian developer Crocus Group chose Scala to drive a wayfinding digital signage installation in four shopping centres across Moscow, as well as in a concert hall.

Crocus Group, a partner of Russia’s Ministry of Economic Development, has deployed the Scala-based digital signage solution to drive 25 full-HD touchscreens in each location. The screens are deployed to make interactive navigation possible for on-site customers.

Each screen is mounted in portrait mode and connected to an individual Scala digital signage player. Crocus Group centrally manages the interactive digital signage wayfinding solution, either uploading content manually through the Scala Content Manager interface or automatically downloading it from various websites.

The Crocus Group website database is also connected to the network. In addition, the team at Crocus Group uses Scala Designer to add banners or scripts to the content appearing on-screen.

The wayfinding solution allows visitors to use the screens as if they were using a personal tablet to access content such as location maps, advertising, site news and-- in the case of the shopping centres-- a mall store list.

Crocus Group plans a network expansion in the near future and expects to double the size of its digital signage network with the opening of new locations.

The gross area of Crocus Group’s completed projects exceeds 1.9 million square meters and approximately 6000 people are employed by the group.

Go Crocus Group and Scala