Analysts open '11 CES by addressing content and security issues facing manufacturers and developers in Internet-connectable CE

Parks Associates wrapped up the fifth-annual CONNECTIONS™ Summit at CES, the first day of 2011 International CES, by addressing the key issues facing CE manufacturers and solutions developers in 2011. The first session, "Analyst Roundtable: The Connected Home Is Here," which broke all previous attendee records, examined key trends and areas of concern, including how Internet-connectable TV devices can avoid the same underwhelming reception that plagued 3DTV after its big splash at CES 2010.

Parks Associates’ recent research finds that – the apps vs. open-browser debate notwithstanding – connected TV manufacturers will find market success with specific content application offerings, particularly premium video-on-demand (movies and TV shows), photo-viewing, social network feeds, streaming music service, customizable widgets, and gaming applications.

With sales of Microsoft Kinects exceeding the company's expectations, and multiple gesture-recognition products debuting at CES, how consumers interact with the television will also be radically changing starting in 2011.

Although online video and applications are major drivers for the rise of connected devices, other areas of focus for CE and service providers in 2011 will be backup, content protection and redundancy, and a greater emphasis on device security. This sets the stage for appliance- and cloud-based storage as well as device security and related features:

• According to Parks Associates, about one-third of U.S. broadband households (32%) are backing up content on at least a monthly basis.

• The firm's recent survey Consumer Demand for Technical Support Services found 20% of consumers are “highly concerned” about losing documents and other digital content because of technical issues, theft, or other catastrophic issues.

• Security concerns are moving into the mobile realm, where U.S. consumers are showing increasing demand for remote protection services for mobile and portable devices. This finding indicates 2011 will be a good year for companies such as Lookout, which provides location and lockdown services for smartphones.

DivX Announces New Partnership With China TV Market Leader, HisenseDivX

DivX, Inc. a leading digital media company, and Hisense Electric Co., Ltd., the number one TV company in China, announced that Hisense has selected DivX Plus HD technology to be integrated in its new line of digital TVs. These revolutionary TVs will enable the playback of DivX Plus HD video using the MKV container, enabling consumers to enjoy videos at HD resolutions up to 1080p in the DivX format using the TV's USB slot.

Hisense is the number one LCD TV brand in China for seven consecutive years, and its share of the LED TV market in China was more than 30% as of May 7, 2010. Its products are also exported to over 130 countries and regions throughout the world. As the first DTV OEM in China to support DivX Plus HD, Hisense's first DivX Plus HD Certified DTV will be available to consumers first in China and soon after in Europe.

DivX Plus HD Certification is the premium level of certification available from DivX, optimized for consumer electronics products and supports the playback of all content created with DivX software. Available on here, DivX Plus Software allows users to create and playback H.264 video in an .mkv file container. DivX Plus HD Certified devices will playback all previous versions of DivX video and DivX Plus HD video files with the .mkv file extension and AAC audio created with third-party tools.

Known for great performance, visual quality and interoperability on any DivX Certified device, DivX provides consumers with a comprehensive digital media solution supporting the majority of high-quality Internet video on their TVs or other consumer electronics devices. In addition, DivX also supports the secure playback of major Hollywood titles from major studios, and many online movie download sites now distribute Hollywood content in the DivX format worldwide.

For more information, click here.

D-Link Announces Integrated Cloud Backup for Its Sharecenter Storage Solution

D-Link, the worldwide leader in innovative home and business networking, and CTERA Networks, an innovator in cloud storage services, announced that the D-Link ShareCenter Network Attached Storage solution has been enhanced with an integrated online backup service by CTERA.

Ideal for the data protection needs of "prosumers" and home offices, the online backup service safeguards against data loss and enables data recovery in case of disaster.

The online backup service offers D-Link 2-Bay ShareCenter users built-in offsite data protection that doesn't require PC software installation and works automatically directly from the NAS appliance. Differential backups and data compression are used to ensure quick and efficient backup. Users can automatically and securely back up data to reliable cloud storage and recover and access their files using a Web browser from anywhere, at any time. They can also roll back their stored files to previous versions, up to 30 days old.

Unlike existing PC-based online backup services, the solution does not limit data backup to a single PC. Rather, it lets users backup all their important files from any PC to their D-Link DNS-323 NAS unit and safeguard them locally and remotely on the "cloud," with no limitations on file size, file type or the number of PCs on the network.

The DNS-323 is part of the D-Link ShareCenter product line that provides greater performance, flexibility and protection against content loss than ordinary external hard drives.

Key Features and Benefits:
Easy setup -- no PC software installation required
Fully automated online backup
Unlimited file types and file sizes
Incremental, compressed transmission with block-level data de-duplication
AES-256 encryption with customer specific secret key, plus 128-bit SSL
Retains previous file versions for up to 30 days
Access and restore files from anywhere using a Web-based portal

Online backup for D-Link's DNS-323 will be available in June 2010. All new and existing DNS-323 owners are entitled to a free 30-day trial. Annual plans are available starting from $99 per year. Pay-as-you-go plans are also available, starting from $4.99 a month. To sign up for the new online backup service, click here. More information on D-Link's ShareCenter product offerings is available here.

CONNECTIONS focuses on New Media & Digital Content, Entertainment Platforms & Services, Home Controls & Energy Management, and CE

CONNECTIONS™ will feature two pre-show research workshops, “Monetizing the Digital Lifestyle” and “Residential Energy Management: Home Area Networks and the Consumer,” on June 8, prior to the conference. Parks Associates’ research teams will provide insight, analysis, and forecasts, including consumer and industry data, in these interactive workshops.

CONNECTIONS™ keynote sessions will feature executives from Intel, Verizon, Samsung LCD Business, and Sony Pictures Entertainment.

CONNECTIONS™ Conference Sessions:

-- Expanding Consumers’ Digital Media Choices
-- Digital Lifestyles: Outlook – A Parks Associates Analyst Roundtable
-- Opening Session - Monetizing Connected CE
-- TV and Online Video Advertising Metrics: Managing the Data
-- Design Elements for Connected CE
-- Mobile Internet and Cloud Services
-- Energy Management as a Key Application for Home Controls
-- Digital Home Technical Support Services
-- DRM, Conditional Access, and Payment Models
-- 3DTV
-- Home Area Network: Architectures and Implications
-- Service Provider Innovation
-- Residential Energy Management
-- Getting Consumers to Care about Home Controls
-- Business Models for Energy Management
-- The Future of the Set-top Box
-- TV Everywhere and Online Video
-- Innovations & Investments: Venture Capitalist Insights

For more information on CONNECTIONS™, visit www.connectionsus.com .

Intel Keynote to discuss Smart TV at CONNECTIONS Conference

Parks Associates announced Wilfred Martis, General Manager, Retail CE, Digital Home Group, Intel Corporation, will deliver the keynote “Smart TVs: Ready for Primetime” at CONNECTIONS™ on Thursday, June 10, at 9:00 a.m.

In his keynote, Mr. Martis will discuss Smart TV, a new category of CE devices that will offer consumers an entirely new interactive TV experience. He will discuss newly announced Google TV*, based on Android*, Chrome* and the Intel® Atom™ processor CE4100, which is a premier example of a Smart TV experience that seamlessly integrates television, the Internet and personal content with search capabilities and access to virtually unlimited applications.

Mr. Martis will examine the technological, content, and business factors that have aligned to jumpstart today’s Smart TV Era. He will offer a roadmap and highlight the business strategies necessary to succeed in this rapidly moving market, which will start to show winners and losers in less than 18 months.

CONNECTIONS™ features multiple sessions on the design, business, and marketing challenges for connected CE and the growing demand for interactive entertainment. Sessions include industry-leading consumer research and executive analysis to highlight the next opportunities and future business strategies for video technologies and platforms.

For more information, visit www.connectionsus.com.

CONNECTIONS US 2010 Agenda Live

CONNECTIONS: The Digital Living Conference and Showcase, hosted by leading research firm Parks Associates, is the premier executive event focused on the market developments and growth factors for advanced digital lifestyle solutions.

This unique research-driven executive conference and showcase delivers insight and recommendations for new business models and opportunities in digital media/content, connected consumer electronics, broadband and value-added services, and home systems.

To view the CONNECTIONS US 2010 agenda, click here.

CONNECTIONS SUMMIT Agenda Announced

The CONNECTIONS™ SUMMIT Sessions, January 7, 2010, in Room S225, South Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center, feature commentary, insight, and debate on successful market strategies and deployment for “digital living” products and services.

Sessions include:
• Consumer Electronics Purchases: Are Consumers Back in the Buying Mood?
• The Connected TV – Displays and Beyond
• Service Provider Strategies for the Connected Home
• The Mobile Aspect of Unified Infotainment: Opportunities and Challenges
• Advances in Television Advertising
• Bringing the Smart Grid to the Smart Home
• 3D: Adding New Dimensions to Entertainment

More info at: www.connectionssummit.com

CONNECTIONS EU: Enabling Technologies - Connecting It All

Consumer electronics manufacturers have many choices when it comes to the design of network-connected products. This CONNECTIONS Europe panel, Enabling Technologies: Connecting It All, brings together companies developing connectivity solutions for both fixed and mobile platforms to discuss these challenges:

• Home networking architectures

• Device discovery software

• Media server solutions

• Conditional access and rights management

• User interfaces

• Software development and execution solutions

• Device and service management elements

Participants on this panel include the following:

Matthew Huntington, VP, Product Marketing, OpenTV
Wouter Leibbrandt, Manager, Advanced Systems Lab, NXP Semiconductors
Peter Smyth, CEO, RedMere
Jon Finegold, Co-Founder and COO, Thinking Screen Media
Ian Walsh, VP of Business Development, ProVision Communications

Moderator: Kurt Scherf, Vice President, Principal Analyst, Parks Associates

CONNECTIONS EU: Defining the New Video Experience

The consumer video experience is incorporating more than just television and movie content. This CONNECTIONS Europe panel identifies the near- and long-term roadmap for the shape of television, video, and entertainment consumption from both CE and service perspectives: New services as supplements to the core video experience; Integrating mobile, online, and PC content into the three-screen ecosystem; The emergence of 3D video and gaming solutions; Cloud services to the set-top box; and Visual networking – bringing social networking to the TVisual networking – bringing social networking to the TV.

Panelists include:
Ronald Brockmann, Managing Director, ActiveVideo Europe
Richard Bullwinkle, Chief Evangelist, Rovi Corporation
Patrik Nilsson, Director, Adobe
Geof Todd, Director of Sales & New Business Initiatives, NDS

Stuart Sikes, President, Parks Associates will be moderating this interactive session.

ActiveVideo and Videon Central Form Partnership: Joint Initiative to Pipe Interactive TV to Millions of Web-Connected CE Devices

ActiveVideo Networks, the global leader in cloud-based interactive television solutions, and Videon Central, Inc., a leading provider of digital video solutions and Blu-ray Disc (BD) middleware, announced a joint initiative that is intended to dramatically speed adoption of the next generation of CE video devices.

The two companies announced that they will work together to leverage the combined strengths of Videon Central (Videon) core middleware technologies and ActiveVideo processing in the network "cloud" to significantly expand the reach and availability of rich, Web-based user experiences that are redefining interactive television (iTV 2.0). ActiveVideo anticipates that a joint solution would be available on Web-connected televisions, BD and DVD players, and other devices in millions of homes by year end, 2010.

Anticipated to be available in more than 5 million homes by the end of 2009, ActiveVideo immerses viewers in an engaging experience that combines Web video, Web 2.0 functionality and traditional television. With ActiveVideo, viewers can navigate a completely interactive environment of both linear and broadband programming including rich interfaces and graphics optimized for TV and remote control navigation; social networking; personal media; niche content; and targeted, actionable advertising. ActiveVideo uses intelligent MPEG streaming to deliver the Web 2.0 experience to a worldwide television audience through both legacy and next generation digital set-top boxes and broadband-connected devices.

For the full press release, click here.

Interview with Eyecon Technologies

Eyecon Technologies' CEO, Meir Friedlander will be speaking on the Bringing “Cloud Media” to Consumer Electronics Devices panel on Wednesday, June 3rd at 2:30 PM.

Here is more insight into Eyecon Technologies...

What is your company's/division's newest initiative?

Launching a revolutionary mobile software application that allows consumers to use their smartphone, MID or netbook to browse, navigate, and play content on any connected media device. The application will also synchronize content between the portable screen and the primary viewing or listening device, say a connected television for example, allowing interactive and social features to easily run in parallel.

What is your company's biggest challenge?

Proving that a two screen parallel viewing, navigation and interactive experience is more practical and functional than viewing widgets and a ten foot GUI on the television screen with a remote control for navigation.

What are your company's long term goals?

Become the "go to" interface for how people find and interact with their digital media content.

What is your company's most successful product/service?
We're new and just starting out but expect great things from our initial product release in June and have already gained traction with content owners, CE vendors, and service providers.

What do you perceive as your company's greatest strength?

We've chosen to fight the right battle. Browsing content on the TV screen has failed in the past (see WebTV) and Media Center approaches lacked the portability and synchronization needed to engage consumers. Our approach not only benefits the consumer, enabling them to discover and navigate the overwhelming number of content choices that are now available, but also helps service and content providers monetize digital distribution.

Opening sessions feature TiVo, YouTube, Cisco, IBM, Yahoo!, VIZIO, AnySource

CONNECTIONS™ to address business strategies for Premium Web Video Content and Connected TV --

Parks Associates announced the speakers for two key sessions, The Marriage of Online Video to CE and Connected TV Strategies, at CONNECTIONS™, June 2-4, at the Santa Clara Convention Center. These sessions address the impact of bringing Web video content to connected TVs and the new business models emerging from manufacturers and content providers as more CE gain enhanced Internet capabilities.

The Marriage of Online Video to CE takes place Tuesday, June 2, 5:15 p.m., following the opening keynote Embedding Wireless in Consumer Electronics, by Glenn Lurie, President of Emerging Devices and Resale, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets.

Speakers for this session:
>> Jim Denney, VP, Product Marketing, TiVo Inc.
>> Brent Hurley, Strategic Partner Development Manager, YouTube
>> Ken Wirt, VP, Consumer Marketing, Cisco Systems

Connected TV Strategies takes place Wednesday, June 3, 9 a.m. It addresses business plans, new revenues models, and marketing strategies for CE manufacturers selling advanced televisions. Following this session, Joseph Ambeault, Director, Product Development and Management, Video Services, Verizon, will present the morning keynote.

Speakers for this session:
>> Bruce Anderson, GM, IBM
>> Mike Harris, CEO, AnySource
>> Matthew McRae, VP, GM, Advanced Platforms, VIZIO
>> Russ Schafer, Sr. Director, Product Marketing, Connected TV, Yahoo!

Parks Associates forecasts that by 2013, worldwide annual sales of connected CE will exceed 100 million units, while cable and IPTV VoD service revenues will reach $11 billion.

To view the full press release, click here.

Connected consumer electronics sales to exceed 100 million units annually by 2013

Consumer demand for digital media and online content will push worldwide annual sales of connected CE to more than 100 million units by 2013, according to the new Parks Associates report Home Networks for Consumer Electronics.

The market for connected CE includes networked TVs, Blu-ray players, game consoles, home media servers, and set-top boxes. Through network and Internet connections, these devices can access and display home network content such as photos and music and retrieve online content such as widgets, games, and video from Hulu and YouTube.

Diverse user scenarios create multiple challenges for technology developers, according to Scherf, including interface design as well as connectivity.

Home Networks for Consumer Electronics covers consumer and technology trends in the connected CE market and provides forecasts for multiple connected CE product categories. For more information, visit http://www.parksassociates.com/, or contact 972-490-1113, sales@parksassociates.com.

The CONNECTIONS™ conference, June 2-4, features a Connected CE track, including the panels Extending the Reach of Wired Networks and Interfaces and Bringing “Cloud Media” to Consumer Electronics Devices. For registration, or to request a press pass, visit http://www.connectionsconference.com/.

To view the full press release, click here.

Getting CE Connected

There are two types of media use cases driving the digital/connected home concept, where multiple devices access rich media from a variety of sources. In both scenarios, the value of connected consumer electronics (CE) will increase as they evolve into media receivers that can discover, aggregate, access, and display media.

The two scenarios for connected CE are the media server, where connected CE devices access content stored on computers and other storage devices inside the home, and the cloud media concept, where connected CE devices link to access services – television, broadband, etc. – to receive streaming and on-demand content from outside of the home.

The Media Server Concept offers solutions to consumers as they acquire large collections of media, both personal and professional, and seek the best means to backup and distribute this content.

The Cloud Media Concept is less centralized. Consumer electronics receive premium content and application services from access networks. These services include entertainment, communications, and media from closed networks (cable, satellite, IPTV) and the so-called “over-the-top” services riding on top of the open Internet.

The CONNECTIONS™ Europe session How Consumer Electronics Get Connected will discuss both scenarios, how they are likely to influence design and sales of other CE and services, and how they evolve together within the home.