otiose ? \OH-shee-ohss\  ? adjective 1 : producing no useful result : futile 2 : being at leisure : idle *3 : lacking use or effect : functionless

NTN Buzztime Purchases i-am TV Assets

This brings me back to the good ole' days with RS&I distribution when I was in the satellite industry. NTN Buzztime was being distributed by RS&I at the time for interactive gaming within the restaurant industry. It looks as though the company has acquired around 1,400 of i-am TV's network of screens located in around 360 of the company's high traffic venues. From the release: 

“Our acquisition of assets from i-am TV has the potential to take our advertising sales initiative to an exciting new level. By expanding our digital broadcast network into numerous prime locations in the top 15 DMAs, we are gaining critical mass to provide major national advertisers with uniquely powerful event, promotion, and sponsorship opportunities,” said Terry Bateman, CEO of Carlsbad, Calif.-based NTN Buzztime. 

“The acquired i-am TV assets are an excellent strategic fit with initiatives we have underway to provide advertisers with sponsored media events and promotional opportunities,” he continued. “We will be offering our proprietary Buzztime content to operators of the acquired screens, potentially contributing to the growth of our overall network viewership. In addition, the assets acquired from i-am TV network include high-quality television screens located in prime locations in major U.S. cities which we believe will ultimately extend our network and enhance our value proposition. 

It looks like a good expansion of NTN Buzztime's current gaming platform into a the broader expanse of the digital out-of-home space. 

ICON Snatches Gridcast 

Can you say acquisition...again? One of the largest media firms in Canada, Gridcast, was snatched up by ICON print, a world leader in large format printing technologies. The A Peter Evans, one of ICON's founders said the following in the recent press release regarding the acquisition: 

"We are really pleased to offer the services of Gridcast to our clients. Digital signage and interactive complements static printing in a unique and dynamic way.  By adding a moving component, we are able cut through the clutter of a retail environment and allow our clients to draw attention to their brand and ultimately increase sales in store."

Started in 2005 by Praveen Gupta and Shawn O'Brien, Gridcast Media has quickly developed a strong customer base of media companies and brands, providing custom solutions and managing many projects from the initial strategy stage through to execution and ongoing management. Gridcast's work can be seen in everything from international airports to major department stores. 

Gridcast has developed a particularly rich skill-set and experience base with large format and interactive projection displays - a subset of the digital signage sector still in its early stages but poised for explosive growth as the technology evolves. 

It sounds like a great marriage for the renowned content creation firm. It also appears that Dave Haynes of Sixteen Nine will be heading up the business development team, helping to drive both the short-term and long-term business strategies for the firm. 

Web-to-TV to Penetrate 24 million homes in 4 years

If you are looking for a place where digital signage technology can work in the private sector, you have found it. I have posted previously on ConnectedTV, Yahoo's Cinematic Internet Service. Digital signage technology is often pigeonholed into just digital signage. It's possibilities are endless. That's why a leap over to the private sector may be a good move for some of our friends in this space. Roku has already "been there and done that." From the press release: 

As consumers expand their viewing of on-demand content on sites like Hulu and YouTube, and broadcast and cable nets face continued cannibalization of ad revenue, cable companies and networks will begin to change their business models. While currently, they view online TV as additive to pay TV services, web-to-TV will ultimately force a complete restructuring of today’s video services.

Full Ad Space on a Digital Billboard? 

Tifton, GA got their first digital billboard and Magic Media sold it out. The sign, which has approximately 25,000 cars pass it each day was sold out. The ads were sold to local banks, jewelers, investment companies, clothing retailers and restaurants. 

“We were impressed with how smoothly the entire sales to installation process was with Watchfire,” said Magic Media’s division vice president David Hornkohl. “Once installation day arrived, our board was installed and we began displaying our customers’ messages immediately. That was important because it meant we were able to keep our promise to our clients and have their ads running on the busiest shopping day of the year — the day after Thanksgiving.”

With all the large format digital billboard rejections I have seen in the news it must be refreshing for this company to have one installed smoothly. 

Lyle Hits His 500th Home Run! 

Congrats are in order to Lyle Bunn for hitting his 500th trained individual for his "Digital Signage SPEED Training" course. I met with him right after he had trained # 500 at the Digital Signage Show. What a nice chap. I think everyone who's ever met the guy can only say the nicest things about him. He's a gentleman and a digital signage scholar. I was not able to attend the SPEED pitch because I only attended day 2 of the digital signage show, but from the other lectures of Bunn's I was able to attend, I found myself quite impressed with his understanding of the signage industry. From the release:

"With Lyle's informative program, Harris was able to assist partners new to the digital signage and digital out-of-home market vertical in laying a solid foundation, and for those already involved, to expand their expertise in successfully addressing digital signage and digital out-of-home opportunities and growing their businesses,” said Kathy Bienz, director, channels management, Americas, Harris Corporation. “Our channel partners were thoroughly impressed with the program — we heard several of them exclaiming ‘I finally get it.’"

I hope everyone enjoyed this week's digital signage news. Stay tuned for more interesting insights. We will continue to pump out interesting news stories from across the web. We realize that sometimes stories are not 100% accurate, but that is up to the reader to decide. If you feel a news correction is in order, please feel free to comment on the story. That's how we roll here :)