Neal's Notes

Yes, it’s that time of the year again – Internet marketing pundits and prognosticators are popping up everywhere to opine about what they think will be hot trends in 2014.

Some of these trends seem interchangeable with 2013; others may have a significant impact for companies and customers as technologies continue to evolve and improve.

Here are a few that grabbed my attention:

Suraj Sondha, who founded UK-based consultancy Internet Marketing Highway, says Search Engine Optimization (SEO) will not be a primary traffic generation tool albeit it will still be a factor in page ranking. Local search will continue to be important, but we’ll see a rise in what Sondha calls Social Media Optimization (SMO).

“More people are turning to social media for research and information; they’re relying on their peers and brands they connect with,” said Sondha. He adds that Internet marketers need to better capitalize on this growing trend.

And mobile will matter more than ever. Forbes, for instance, recently reported that by 2017, 87 percent of connected devices sales (including desktop and laptop PCs) will be smart phones and tablets.

“The shift toward mobile is undeniable,” added Drew Hendricks, writing in Tech Cocktail. “Next year’s Internet marketing battlefield will play out largely on mobile devices, as a growing number of users expect to access products, services, apps, and information on smart phones and tablets. Your business needs to have a responsive design in place and online features catering to a mobile audience.”

Many online users are bombarded daily with a plethora of ads. No matter if banners, frame ads or other formats, what’s critical for 2014 will be the need for smart image content; and by that, specifically, content that’s easy on the eye and quickly digestible.

As reported by Jayson DeMers in Forbes, blog posts that garner the most social shares all weave in strategically placed visuals to break up content and to emphasize key points.

“Another example is infographics which combines images with a minimal amount of text to explain a topic and provide statistical information or data from research studies,” said DeMers.

Two more trends worth mentioning.

Expect ad retargeting (a cookie-based technology that uses Javascript code to anonymously follow your audience online) to go mainstream. San Francisco-based ReTargeter (see their visual illustrating how the technology works) provides one of the more cogent explanations on how/why ad retargeting can be effective as part of an overall Internet marketing strategy:

“Retargeting works best in conjunction with inbound and outbound marketing or demand generation. Strategies involving content marketing, AdWords and targeted display are great for driving traffic, but they don’t help with conversion optimization. Conversely, retargeting can help increase conversions, but it can’t drive people to your site. Your best chance of success is using one or more tools to drive traffic and retargeting to get the most out of that traffic.”

And my favorite trend – less will be more. Again, most of us are getting so overwhelmed by online digital clutter that it is becoming a real challenge for Internet marketers to capture our attention – and wallets. Instead of shouting at us, DeMers reported that we’ll see more simplistic marketing messages that are clean and offer minimalist aesthetics.

“Innovative marketers are now making efforts to tone-down their campaign messages and not overwhelm consumers with hype,” added DeMers.

I hope this particular 2014 trend does indeed come true.

Mass market deployment of 4K/UHD is not going to happen overnight.

But as the ecosystem matures, the potential is huge. Futuresource Consulting for instance, estimates that 4K TV sets will increase from 62,000 units last year to almost 800,000 by year’s end – and skyrocket to about 22 million units by 2017.

But there are a number of potential bumps in the road.  As reported in TechZone 360, a number of operator challenges must be surmounted.

“Delivery of 4K requires four times the bandwidth of 1080p, which has significant implications for the production and distribution chains,” said Adam Cox, head of broadcast equipment at Futuresource.

While tools like HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) compression can mitigate some of the delivery overhead for pay-TV providers, one factor that’s affecting 4K investment added TechZone 360, is “a lack of an accepted broadcasting and transmission standard that meets the defined UltraHD TV spec and a current lack of 4K content – a big obstacle to the adoption of 4K TV sets and general uptake by consumers.”

No surprise then, that a panel of experts who recently sat down at the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) 2013 Symposium in Hollywood, offered further insights on key issues and challenges that will drive how 4K/UHD is accepted by the marketplace.  SMPTE is the technical society for the motion imaging industry, founded in 1916.  Members are spread throughout 64 countries worldwide.

Entitled, ‘Who Will Make Money in the 4K Ecosystem,’ the panel was moderated by entertainment industry veteran Marty Shindler, who heads up Los Angeles-based The Shindler Perspective, an entertainment/entertainment technology management consulting firm.

Panelists included:

• Peter McGuinness, Director of Multimedia Technology Marketing, Imagination Technologies

• Tom Adams, Senior Principal Analyst, US Media, IHS

• Bryan Burns, President/CEO, The Forward Direction Group

• Peter Keith, VP/Senior Research Analyst, Piper Jaffray

The panelists discussed a wide array of business-centric issues – who will profit in the 4K ecosystem, what could delay implementation, who are the suppliers making investments, who’s active in the 4K value chain, and more.

”It will take a substantial investment in infrastructure before 4K makes a significant penetration into homes,” said Adams. “And it’s all about image – if your product looks great in 4K, advertisers will get behind the technology.”

And sports, added Burns, is likely to be one of the genres most likely to be captured in 4K because it has such uniform and commercial appeal.  But he added a caveat that widespread acceptance could take longer because the major networks have yet to convert all their trucks to HD.  In fact, one panel session attendee from a well-known sports network said he didn’t think it would be possible for them to get the content from the truck to the station because they are still using JPEG 2000 (an image compression standard and coding system) for insertion quality – right now they just don’t have the bandwidth for that if they convert to UHD.

Imagination’s McGuinness said it’s inevitable that 4K will be available on handsets and tablets, eventually allowing people to generate their own content.

“This will drive demand for them to also replace their TV sets, therefore the mobile arms race is actually going to drive adoption, not the TV networks,” he said.

McGuinness added that‘s where H.265 comes in – the codec is designed to utilize substantially less bandwidth thanks to advanced encoding techniques and a more sophisticated encode/decode model. It was also built to match the capabilities of future screens and includes support for 10-bit color and high frame rates.

On the retail front, it will be a few years before TV set manufacturers will make any money, said Keith.

“People like to show off their TVs – as prices come down, we’ll see an uptick in interest.  We’re also seeing more unilateral pricing policies from brick and mortar and online companies like Costco, Best Buy and Amazon, so as prices come down in a controlled fashion, this will help sell 4K TVs to consumers,” said Keith.

And the bottom line?

The panellists were in agreement that upgrading to 4K will be a major investment not only from a technology infrastructure perspective, but for the consumer as well – manufacturers will have to pitch an effective use case to end users that 4K is the next cool thing.

Pundits/prognosticators/mavens/gurus – call them what you like – are now popping up more frequently now as we get closer to punting 2013 and welcoming in 2014.

So what’s on tap? What’s hot, what’s not for next year?

Forbes recently outlined a number of online marketing trends that they believe will be integral to companies/marketers in 2014.

A handful of examples:

Content Marketing

The Content Marketing Institute says top B2B content marketing strategies are articles on a company’s website, social media, e-newsletters, case studies, videos and articles on other websites. Marketing to the masses is becoming passé – it’s more effective to produce engaging content designed for specific audiences.

Image-Centric Content on the Rise

Buzzfeed and Pinterest – Forbes says these are just two examples of how image-based content can help a company’s product or service go viral. “Successful blog posts that receive the most social shares also usually have a common characteristic – they pepper in some well-placed pictures to break content up and emphasize certain points,” notes Forbes.

Mobile-Friendly Content Absolutely Essential

Get with it – the shift from boxy PCs and laptops to mobile devices is accelerating – your business won’t remain competitive unless you create content that’s accessible to mobile users. In fact, Forbes predicts that by 2017, an astounding 87% of connected devices sales will be tablets and smartphones.

Ad Retargeting Becoming More Popular

Only two percent of web traffic converts on the first visit; ad retargeting can help increase conversion rates by reminding consumers what product or service they saw online. Browser cookies are utilized to track visited websites and once a user leaves a site, those products/services will be shown to them again in ads across different websites. “This keeps the brand and product at the top of the consumer’s mind,” noted Forbes. “Due to the success that many marketers have had with ad retargeting, there’s a good chance that it will become more mainstream in 2014.”

Ajay Prasad, reporting in New Canaan Patch, added that author ranking will play a pivotal role, e.g., creating engaging and regular content on various social media platforms will result in more people responding, commenting, sharing whatever the author’s waxing eloquent on, e.g., a product, service, etc.

And Neil Asher, who heads up ROARLocal, a UK digital marketing agency, says we’ll see the rise of video monetization next year. Asher said online video advertising is starting to compete with traditional TV advertising.

“Although the format isn’t as forgiving, with the average ad lasting 15 seconds, it’s time to take this venue seriously,” said Asher. “From creating original content as part of a content marketing plan, to actively using video ads to promote your services, video is where it’s at.”

And social media is now a game changer on the political front and will continue to do so.

Indonesia, for instance, has 64 million Facebook users and about 30 million Twitter users. Social media, according to the Jakarta Globe, is playing a key role in disseminating information and educating people on political issues in advance of the July 9, 2014 presidential election.

And India, with 778 million eligible voters, has 82 million Facebook users. The April-May 2014 general election for the 16th Lok Sabha (the lower house of India’s parliament) is already generating a lot of buzz in the social media world. Many key candidates have created extensive Twitter and Facebook profiles/pages operated by various parties to help influence voters.

Social media, noted Indian Affairs, is becoming an essential tool for politicians since India’s population is very young – 50% are below age 28 and the young population is becoming increasingly tech savvy/literate.

“Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus and text messages are all now enabled for Indian languages. Not knowing English is no longer a constraint,” added Indian Affairs.

The publication also succinctly summed up what lies ahead in 2014:

“Social media will influence the mainstream media, set the agenda for television, and will be a source for spotting the ‘buzz’ that will function like TV debates of the new age in which citizens are now participants.”

When you think of key geographic locales for technology startups, odds are Silicon Valley immediately comes to mind. Ditto with the Route 128 corridor near Boston, perhaps Northern Viriginia/Washingon, D.C.

But San Diego? Add ‘America’s Finest City’ to the list. The city is fast becoming a hotbed for successful tech startups in a wide variety of verticals thanks in part to a number of entrepreneur-oriented networking organizations that bring together startup executives, prospective investors, academicians, and more. Some of these include StartUp San Diego, part of the Startup America partnership, and StartupCircle, founded in 2007 by Robert Reyes. The former claims 370 ‘SD Startuppers’ as members and lists three main goals:

• Provide valuable resources and connections to help young companies grow
• Support regional startup ecosystems throughout the country
• Recognize startups as important drivers of the economy

StartUpCircle has also posted some impressive objectives:

• Achieve $1 billion of valuation growth and $100 million of investment
• Support 200 student entrepreneurs to create 50 startups generating $30 million
• Attract 10 international startups to generate over 1,000 local jobs
• Continued emphasis on female entrepreneurs by funding 30 female entrepreneurs
• Complete 10 venture manufacturing deals between Mexico and San Diego

Some startups currently working with Startup Circle, for instance, include Anametrix – the company provides a cloud-based real-time marketing analytics platform; DAR.fm – a free radio recording service; and BUMP Network, which provides software and technology to assist enterprise customers with membership, monetization and communication programs.

StartUp Circle also hosts monthly events providing a showcase for startups to make brief presentations to attendees. Earlier this month, healthcare entrepreneurs flocked to the offices of a well-known law firm, Mintz Levin; keynotes included:

• Portable Genomics – the company founded by Patrick Merel, develops software for comprehensive visualization of personal genomic data.

• Yolia Health – Founded by Alberto Osio, the biomedical device company helps eye care providers preserve, restore, enhance vision through non-invasive treatment.

• Anywhere Science – Established by Brian Noland, the company has developed the LabStrip ecosystem that leverages an iPhone into a personalized mobile lab.

Two other companies in attendance that didn’t make full-blown presentations also merit watching.

As outlined by CEO Alan Remen, San Diego-based MyoStim is a medical device company focused on delivering heart muscle regeneration, blood flow stimulation and wound healing products producing angiogenesis, myogenesis and arteriogenesis results through implementation of the company’s patented electro-stimulation technologies.

Philippe Faurie, CEO of LabATM (web site still being developed), located in Solana Beach, CA, said his fledgling company is dedicated to providing consumers with access to testing platforms and tools to personalize the prevention of chronic diseases and simultaneously enable the company to provide critical material on a large scale to companies focused on genetic, environmental, and health diagnostic analysis, as well as pharmacogenomics.

It’s encouraging that regional startup organizations like the aforementioned are bringing together people and companies from all walks of life; what’s happening now in San Diego will hopefully take root in other cities nationwide!

SIGGRAPH (Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques) just wrapped up its 40th annual convention a few days ago; this year’s event was held in Anaheim. The convention is organized by ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society.

ACM reported that more than 17,000 artists, research scientists, gaming experts and developers, filmmakers, students, and academics from 77 countries attended; more than 180 industry organizations exhibited.

While it’s always interesting to roam the aisles to view the latest offerings of established companies, it’s just as compelling to visit the Studio and Emerging Technologies exhibits.  Both are great opportunities for attendees to nose around and play with a considerable array of new techniques and media encompassing 3D printing, modeling, and animation software.

Studio, according to a SIGGRAPH spokesperson, serves as a hub for tech creation.

“Studio is a stand out program at SIGGRAPH,” said Patricia Clark, SIGGRAPH 2013 Studio Chair. “Attendees have the chance to see how experienced professionals are making the technology work for them in real life.”

Emerging Technologies, organized by Dylan Moore and his team, showcases technologies being developed in labs and studios worldwide.

A number of demos on display at the Studio could one day find real-world applications and markets. One of these was EMY (Enhancing Mobility), a full-body exoskeleton designed to help quadriplegics. EMY was created by a team of 20 researchers and engineers working for Paris-based CEA List. One key design element — the arms can be used as haptic devices.

Light-in-Flight was developed by a research team from the University of British Columbia in Canada. The portable device allows inexpensive and fast transient imaging using photonic mixer devices (PMDs). One potential real-world market, say the researchers, could include more effective ways to measure surface reflectance, which could have both industrial and research applications.

WAYLA is an eye-tracking technology developed by a research team from Carnegie Mellon University (Pittsburgh, PA) and Madeira Interactive Technologies Institute (Portugal). The team integrated eye-tracking technology into a video game. While there are a number of software companies already offering eye-tracking systems, these are primarily used for studying human behavior (psychology, psychiatry, psycholinguistics), neurosciences and for market research. The researchers said few attempts have been made to integrate eye trackers into video games – so the market potential could be considerable.

Lastly, a research team from the University of Southern California (USC) debuted Skyfarer, a mixed-reality shoulder exercise game developed for preventing/treating shoulder pain for individuals with spinal-cord injury.

The USC team said the system is based on a second-generation integrated exercise hardware/software system that was evaluated in a biomechanical study at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center in Downey, CA, about 20 miles from downtown Los Angeles.

“The system consists of an adjustable metal rig outfitted with GameTrak sensors that are attached to interchangeable TheraBands (a line of progressive elastic resistance exercise products developed/manufactured by The Hygenic Corporation) and free weights. The rig can accommodate individuals with various types of manual wheelchairs and can be adjusted for arm length,” said the USC researchers.

Who knows – by the time SIGGRAPH 2014 comes around (in Vancouver, British Columbia), some of these technologies may already be in the marketplace!

Walk up and down the aisles of last week’s Intersolar North America conference in San Francisco and the gist generally echoed among exhibitors, attendees, industry analysts and the media is that the future looks bright for the solar industry. In fact, according to EuPD Research, the solar market is poised to add about 3.9 GW of new solar capacity by the end of this year; in the U.S., the grid storage market could hit 4 GW by 2016.

More municipalities in the U.S. are also taking proactive steps in utilizing solar – earlier this month, Palo Alto, California, Ground Zero for Silicon Valley, approved 80 megawatts in solar power purchase agreements (PPAs) to meet approximately 18 percent of the city’s load. In addition, as reported by Greentech Media, three solar projects slated to be operational by 2017 will generate almost half of the city’s renewables; Palo Alto also estimates that meeting its goal of being 100% carbon-neutral will cost each ratepayer about $3 per year.

But back to the conference – with about 700 exhibitors and 18,000 attendees, Intersolar North America had a little something for everyone. There were a slew of panels, breakfast sessions, and more, appealing to a wide swath of attendees. One event, the PV Energy World Stage, focused on production technology- everything from crystalline silicon and roll-to-roll manufacturing of organic solar cells to inkjet processes.

Solar Power World Editorial Director Frank Andorka attended a breakfast with the truSolar Initiative, a consortium of leading solar market participants (panelists included executives from consortium members Assurant Insurance, Distributed Sun, PanelClaw and Underwriters Laboratories) that’s trying to establish uniform credit screening standards for commercial and industrial photovoltaic (PV) projects. Andorka said the organization, formed earlier this year, is also trying to develop a common language between the solar industry and financiers that’s critical to the future strength of the industry.

Another panel session comprised entirely of solar industry CEOs, said the solar industry will be characterized over the next few years by increased diversification in terms of both geography and market segment.

As reported by Intersolar News, “large-scale utility installations will witness growth in developing regions with surging appetites for energy such as Asia and Africa, but also in the Middle East, which is increasingly turning to solar as a means of preserving its fossil future energy assets for sale abroad, and in the desert regions of the U.S. South and West.”

Intersolar News also reported that we’ll see an increase of solar to power electric cars. Pierre-Pascal Urbon, CEO of SMA Technology AG, based in Germany, said “people want to connect their PV systems with their house and their cars, and manage both through their smart phones.”

Numerous companies used Intersolar North America to debut new products and services. Boulder, CO-based AlsoEnergy, which provides energy monitoring/financial management software solutions for renewable energy developers, manufacturers, and investors, unveiled PowerOperations, an operations management workflow module, and PowerRes, a residential packaged designed/tailored for the financial community and developers of residential lease programs for the solar market.

And dozens of companies displayed a wide array of inverters. SMA Technology AG introduced its Sunny Boy TL-US series that, per a press release, represent “an evolutionary leap forward in residential string inverter performance.”

While California Gov. Edmund G. Brown, Jr., indicated in his conference keynote opener that California has set a target of 33% of renewably-sourced energy by 2020, perhaps the potential long-term growth of the solar industry was best summed up by Dan E. Arvizu, director of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Arvizu said over the next decade, photovoltaics will increase tenfold and institutional investors will inject $2 trillion into PV endeavors.

Looks like sunny days ahead.

The practice of serving ads matching past online behavior, known as ‘retargeting’ is nothing new – Doubleclick introduced its Boomerang technology over a decade ago.

Retargeting is now experiencing a significant uptick in adoption, noted Jack Marshall in Digiday.  Marshall said dedicated ad networks and the increased popularity of exchanges are contributing to this resurgence.

In essence, retargeting allows businesses to target their ads based on a user’s past activity.  Businesses can target ads to people who visited their site but didn’t purchase anything.  Retargeting can also encompass numerous marketing channels such as email, online advertising, paid search and social media.

“Because the targeting is meant to be precise and the ad message can be customized, advertisers frequently see significant higher click-through-rates and purchases from retargeted ads,” said JD Lasica, writing in Socialmedia.biz.

Lasica said retargeting can:

Bring people back who abandoned the shopping cart process;

Deliver a discount coupon or inform previous visitors of a sale;

Remind viewers of yoru product at a later date when they might be ready to purchase.

“Even on Facebook, a large portion of ads are now retargeted,” added Marshall. “In fact, Facebook’s ad exchange took off on the back of retargeting.”

And last month, MIT Technology Review reported that Facebook would allow marketers to retarget ads in people’s News Feeds based on their browsing history.

Some other companies offering retargeting products include AdRoll, Clicksor, Fetchback, Google, Retargeter and Rocketfuel.

Retargeting is also catching on in the mobile space.  TapCommerce, a New York City-based startup, snared $1.2 million in funding last year that it has used to roll out mobile retargeting apps for mobile phones, mobile websites and tablets on Android, iPhone or iPad.

TapCommerce CEO/co-founder Brian Long, interviewed a few weeks ago by TechCrunch, said his company uses large amounts of data coupled with sophisticated statistical analysis “to produce extremely accurate results for retargeting.”

Long added a key mobile retargeting challenge was that “mobile inventory was siloed into a few mobile ad networks.”  This has been surmounted, he said, by working through the real-time mobile exchanges “to reach a very large audience and retarget efficiently.”

Retargeting can be a versatile B2B strategy – if implemented effectively.  But Kip Voytek, director of digital innovation at MDC Partners, said there’s always room for improvement – “advertisers must work within digital ad buying options available from Web publishers and technology providers, which have been slow to evolve.”

And Marshall added another caveat – “if chasing users round the Web for weeks shifts product, advertisers won’t stop any time soon, unless the numbers shake out and they can prove to themselves that retargeting is standing on the back of other media and calling itself tall.”

Less than 72 hours ago, the Associated Press reported that doctors at C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor used a 3D laser printer to create an airway splint that saved a baby boy who was having critical daily breathing problems.

The hospital used computer-guided lasers that stacked/fused plastic layers into more than a hundred tiny tubes. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration gave the hospital special permission to implant one of the tubes in the baby, who’s now doing just fine.

In addition to healthcare, 3D printing is fast making significant inroads in a wide variety of vertical markets.

“It’s the wave of the future,” said Dr. Robert Weatherly, a pediatric specialist at the University of Missouri in Kansas City.

Elizabeth Royte, writing in this month’s Smithsonian Magazine, reported that even the printing of organs – and cartilage and skin and tissue – “holds great promise for transforming healthcare and extending longevity. Transplanted organs from a patient’s own tissues won’t be rejected. Waiting times for kidneys and other donor organs will decrease, and organ traffickers could be put out of business.”

One of Royte’s sources, Anthony Atala, who heads up the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, says in a few years hospitals will have 3D printers that can print skin – “from subcutaneous fat up through keratinocytes to hair follicles, oil glands and melanocytes – directly into a patient’s body.”

3D printing, like most other technologies, may have a dark side. Earlier this month Defense Distributed, a Texas-based company, posted details online on how to make a plastic gun (called the ‘Liberator’) using a 3D printer (see Fox News photo). The U.S. State Department ordered the company to take the blueprints offline because they may contain data controlled by the federal government – Defense Distributed has now complied. Before the firm did so, there were more than 100,000 downloads worldwide.

Forbes also reported that 15 of the gun’s 16 pieces were made on an $8,000 Stratasys Dimension SST 3D printer. “The final piece is a common nail, used as a firing pin that can be found in a hardware store” noted Forbes.

A U.S. Department of Homeland Security intelligence bulletin issued on May 21 highlighted the U.S. government’s chief concerns:

“Significant advances in 3D printing capabilities, availability of free digital 3D printer files for firearms components, and difficulty regulating file sharing may present public safety risks from unqualified gun seekers who obtain or manufacture 3D printed guns…magnetometers may fail to detect the Liberator, depending on device sensitivity. Future designs could further reduce or eliminate metal entirely…unqualified gun seekers may be able to acquire or manufacture their own Liberators with no background checks.”

But as the technology continues to evolve, hopefully 3D printing will be an agent of good.

Peter Friedman, who publishes the Innovation Investment Journal, said car dealers, for instance, might eventually include free 3D printers with vehicles so owners can manufacture their own parts.

“3D printing is not just the future of making things you don’t have…it’s the future of making things that you do have immortal,” he said.

However, to use some British vernacular, this may result in a sticky wicket. Royte pointed out a number of legal issues that will pop up:

“Who is liable if a home-printed design fails to perform? Who owns the intellectual property of codes and the objects they produce? 3D printing is bound to encourage counterfeiting, with serious consequences for brand owners,” Royte said.

In addition to the plastic gun example mentioned earlier, Royte said hackers have already stolen personal banking information after creating a widget on a 3D printer that fits inside an ATM.

Nonetheless, 3D printing could jumpstart certain industries.

One of these is the solar energy industry.

John J. Licata, chief energy strategist of Blue Phoenix, a consultancy focusing on next generation energy, believes 3D printing will revolutionize solar panel and photovoltaic (PV) cell manufacturing.

Licata said a lack of energy storage, coupled with manufacturing inefficiencies, have had a negative impact on the industry – future production of solar cells need to be more sustainable.

“3D solar cells, despite advances in energy storage, can capture more sunlight than conventional PV models because they are more precise (using copper, indium, gallium, selenide), less complex and weigh less,” said Licata.

He also pointed out that researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) believe 3D solar panels could be about 20 percent more efficient than flat solar panels – 3D printing can extend the amount of solar absorbed into cells.

Licata added that 3D printing may also drop production costs by half by eliminating various inefficiencies associated with the waste of costly materials like glass or polysilicon.

“The ability to control material inputs of your finished solar product would further turn traditional manufacturing of PV on its head by creating more of an on-demand model that doesn’t require fabrication at distant warehouses,” he said.

Lastly, Licata believes that 3D printing can generate very thin solar cells that can be printed on untreated paper, plastic or fabric rather than expensive glass.

“Creating lighter weight flexible solar panels could have bigger positive implications for wearable hi-tech clothing, radios and future electronics,” he said.

Assuming, like all relatively new technologies, that the costs of 3D printers will start to decrease, 3D printing could lead to a new wave of customization for businesses.

Eric Savitz of Forbes reported that this customization potential will compel “leaders to adjust their sales, distribution and marketing channels to take advantage of their capability to provide customization direct to the consumer.”

And from the consumer’s perspective, noted Carine Carmy, director of marketing for Shapeways, a 3D printing marketplace and community, 3D printing helps extend the conversation with brands opened by digital and social media to possibly co-creating products. She also succinctly summed up the technology’s potential:

“As previously occurred with social media, brands early to adopt 3D printing will be in a position to define the market and develop their way to innovation.”

Sky’s the limit. Stay tuned.

Market research firms sponsor literally hundreds, if not thousands of conferences around the globe. While one key objective, understandably, is to directly or subliminally promote the firm’s products/services, the topics will hopefully be both educational and informative and attract attendees, keynote speakers, and panel participants who are well regarded in their respective fields and bring added value.
A good example is the recently concluded Linley Tech Mobile Conference, held last week in Santa Clara, CA and organized by Mountain View, CA-based The Linley Group, a market research firm providing independent technology analyses of semiconductors for networking, communications, mobile, and wireless applications. The company also produces a trade publication, Microprocessor Report.

This was the fourth year the event was held; according to company founder and Principal Analyst Linley Gwennap, the conference attracted about 200 people, including those from mobile IP and chip companies, handset and other device vendors, carriers and software vendors, as well as the financial community and press. Attendees represented a broad range of companies, including Broadcom, China Mobile, Cisco, Dell, Ericsson, HP, Huawei, Imagination Technologies, Marvel, Samsung and Sony, as well as financial analysts from Bank of America, Credit Suisse, UBS, and Wells Fargo.

The conference focused on a wide array of topics; here’s a snapshot:
• Heterogeneous processing
• Licensable CPUs for mobile devices
• Licensable GPU and DSP cores
• Mobile semiconductors
• Mobile SoC design issues
• Mobile software trends
• Multicore application processors
• Other low-power IP cores

The presentations addressed design issues for mobile devices — tablet computers, smartphones, navigation devices, media players, handheld games, and e-book readers.

One of the conference highlights, noted Gwennap, was a panel on the growing China mobile market, featuring executives from China Mobile, Imagination Technologies, MediaTek and Spreadtrum. The panel addressed key challenges and opportunities for mobile products in China, the diverging demands of Chinese consumers and the different tiering in that enormous market. One interesting takeaway: the total available market for mobile handsets in China is larger than the entire population of the United States!

Another session on mobile CPUs talked about major issues for mobile product development. One of the panelists, Mark Throndson, serves as Director of Processor Technology Marketing for UK-based Imagination Technologies.

One of Throndson’s conclusions was that industry trends are forcing more efficiency in how companies build products, and to enable this, new technologies are abstracting software development away from the underlying hardware/instruction sets.

“At the end of the day, even though software is becoming less dependent on the hardware it runs on, good underlying architectures are still important as they affect the user experience through delivering high performance, longer battery life, and lower costs,” said Throndson.

Another interesting session focused on power-optimized design. This is an increasing challenge as today’s mobile devices integrate ever-more features and functionality, yet battery technology hasn’t kept pace. A couple of session participants proposed that the answer lies in adding a bit more complexity in hardware to handle power management. While this additional logic may consume some power, the end result, according to these panelists, is increased efficiency and longer battery life.

I’ve been to gobs of analyst-driven events that focused too much on promoting the market research firm and its offerings; the buzz on the Linley gathering from attendees is that it was two days well-spent.

With this year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC) now behind us, what were some of the key takeaways?

One of the most interesting occurred before the exhibit halls opened — the first GDC State of the Industry survey that polled more than 2,500 attendees. The results revealed some intriguing trends in funding, platform preference and publishing models.

For starters, how are developers funding their projects? A few survey numbers:

• 72% are being funded by a company’s existing war chest or an individual’s personal funds

• 9% are from VCs

• 10% are publisher-funded

• 4% are crowdfunded – and 8% of the developers have worked on crowdfunded projects, with another 44% planning to go this route in the future

Indies Rising

The survey also found that 53% of respondents consider themselves ‘indie developers’; 46% are employed at companies of 10 people or less – and only 24% reported they worked with a publisher on their last game.

Platforms

According to survey results, more respondents are developing for smartphones and tablets than for any other platform – 38% released their last game for smartphones and tablets; 55% are making their current games there; 58% will release their next games on these platforms.

Cool Stuff

Survey results aside, there were some cool products to play with and even some significant Windows 8 stats rolled out by Microsoft as part of its full-court press to draw more games and developers to the platform.

Hands down, the most popular was Irvine, CA-based Oculus VR’s Rift, a virtual reality headset with stereoscopic 3-D, a 110-degree field of view and low-latency head tracking. Woe to anyone who strayed along the footpath leading up to their booth once the morning doors swung wide – they would have been trampled by the hordes who ran pell mell to line up and play ‘Hawken’, a first-person shooter game that situates players inside a levitating war machine.

Beyond, the hype, equally impressive was that the company raised $2.4 million from crowdfunding.

As reported by John Gaudiosi, editor of Gamerhub.tv, a video syndication network, Zombie Studios demonstrated Daylight, slated for release sometime this fall. It’s the first horror game for Sony’s new PlayStation 4. A team of six people, noted Gaudiosi, created the game and are self-publishing on PlayStation 4.

Daylight, said Gaudiosi, “traps players inside a haunted insane asylum. Armed only with the light and apps from your in-game smartphone, you must try to get out alive. There are no weapons other than your feet – which are best used to run.”

Gaudiosi added that the developer has written “a lot of back story about centuries of souls who were mistreated within the asylum’s walls.”

Lastly, Develop said that Microsoft is attracting a slew of developers to Windows 8, some of which include Disney, GameHouse and Glu. The publication added that “as for revenue share on the Windows Store and what benefits successful developers can receive on the platform, should an app pass $25,000 in sales, developers will start receiving an 80% share of all subsequent sales, instead of the usual 70/30 split.”

Look forward to seeing what will unfold during GDC 2014!