Now in its third year, Tuesday’s daylong Emerging Trends Day program paired presentations from experts with spirited panel discussions to inspire and educate attendees on what’s happening at the frontiers of the industry.
“Here is the story of cloud, here is the story of hardware giving way in some cases to services, as we start to build out solutions that require a lot more IP as the fundamental language and connective tissue,” said Sean Wargo, senior director of market intelligence at AVIXA and the master of ceremonies for the program, in his introduction to the day’s first session, “IP as the Universal Language of AV.” “This story is about connectivity.”
New for this year, presentations were followed by panel discussions, concluding with an opportunity for attendees to ask questions. In addition to the aforementioned leadoff session on the ever-evolving landscape of AV over IP, which had an introduction by Anthony Brennan of Futuresouce and panel moderated by AV Nation’s Tim Albright, the program included discourse on “Disruptive Audio Technologies,” with an intro by Paul Erikson of IHS Markit Research and a panel moderated by Janice Brown of RLab; “Disruptive Video Technologies,” presented by Pete Putman of ROAM Consulting and a panel moderated by Sanju Kahtri of IHS Markit Research; and “Disruptive UCC Technologies,” with a presentation by Ira M. Weinstein of Recon Research and a panel discussion moderated by Owen Ellis of the AV User Group.
“The key theme today is that you are the disruption,” Wargo said. “By listening to what you have today, and the perspectives that the panelists brought forward, we’re hoping to arm you with questions so that you can go to the floor, to manufacturers, the vendors of solutions and technologies and say, ‘How does this help? How does this address key end user needs? How can we be disruptive and ask the difficult questions out there to make sure we’re providing simplicity, ease of use, and actual usability?’”
