TV. I’ve long said that 3D and connectivity were in some ways sideshows that TV manufacturers were trotting out until they could get to that terra firma of marketing better picture quality, and CES 2012 marked the beginning of the journey home with LG and Samsung showing off 55” OLED TVs and Sony unveiling plans to use a competitive technology dubbed Crystal LED. Of course, these new display technologies aren’t mutually exclusive to either 3D (which the offerings from LG and Samsung support) or connectivity. Indeed, one of the big TV focal points for Samsung was the idea of Smart TV Evolution, in which the “computing” part of the set, including components such as the processor, can be swapped out every year to keep up with the latest advances. This essentially borrows from the old idea of desktop CPU and RAM upgrades, but in the connected AV space.

Ultrabooks. The TV was not the only high-grossing holiday favorite to receive a push forward. Intel drove ultrabooks hard at the show amid several promising debuts from Acer (the S5), HP (the Spectre), Dell (XPS 13), Samsung (the revamped Series 9) and the 360-degree rotating Lenovo Yoga, which was a finalist at the Last Gadget Standing competition for which I served as a judge. Intel vowed to justify its heavy investment in the ultrabook name – which it says will account for it largest marketing push since Centrino – by making ultrabooks stronger competitors to tablets using movement sensors, touch screens, speech, and Kinect-like gesture input. In what stands to be its last CES appearance for the foreseeable future, Microsoft was also showing off Windows 8. And while it didn’t have much news on that front, Intel’s push for touch on ultrabooks certainly provides stronger alignment between the two PC giants.

The Crossovers. One of the greater bits of evidence that the attention was on incumbent categories at this CES was the big crossover moves by Lenovo and Vizio. The former announced its first television (for China only, to start), an Android 4.0-infused dual core 55” IPS display with a motion controller, and an integrated Lenovo app store. Vizio, coming over from the TV side, showed off several ultra-thin notebooks and desktops. The desktops will include a wireless keyboard, trackpad, and even a remote control in the box. Curiously, the notebooks, while qualifying as ultrabooks under Intel’s definition won’t be marketed as such, as Vizio stakes its claims.

Imaging Products. This year looks like it will finally be the year of the connected camera (and camcorder!). Of course, over the years, we’ve seen Sony and Kodak experiment with Wi-Fi in their cameras but, following Samsung’s expansion of its Wi-Fi camera line, both venerable brands were back with Kodak bowing the EasyShare M750 and Sony realizing what was to be the next step for the Flip camcorder line with the Bloggie live Wi-Fi-enabled camcorder. The hot segment of POV action cameras also got in on the Wi-Fi excitement with GoPro showing off a new Wi-Fi add-on for its Hero 2 and GoBandit showing off a Wi-Fi action camcorder.

Home Networking. With so much emphasis on higher-speed networking devices, particularly TVs, in the home, it’s no surprise that home networking standards are being elevated as well. The next version of Wi-Fi, 802.11ac, should double throughput in the 5 GHz band while a new standard, 802.11ad, which brings forward the work of the WiGig Alliance, will allow for multi-gigabyte transfer of data over same-room distances as well as displaying uncompressed HD video from a tablet or smartphone up to an HDTV. Meanwhile, the standards battle for new “no new wires” technology continues, with HomePlug AV 2 citing the benefits of its field experience against the HomeGrid/G.hn camp.

Health and Fitness. Not everything was a step up for the familiar. CES continued to show that we are moving toward a future that can include self-monitoring of nearly every vital sign. No fewer than three connected scales were on display with pioneer Withings showing off a connected baby scale. Two of the more intriguing products were from Basis, which can measure a wide array of inputs such as perspiration levels and pulse to determine the kind of exercise one is engaging in, and Striiv, which combines several motivation techniques and challenges to keep its owners on the move. Striiv includes its own miniature touchscreen, further bucking the trend of using the smartphone as the input and output for a range of “appcessories.”

Cellular Enablement. While nearly all of the major “screens” at CES included Wi-Fi, there were also signs of cellular access seeping into older and newer categories. These included the PlayStation Vita, for which AT&T will be the carrier in its HSPA+ configuration due to ship next month. Seagate also showed off an LTE-enabled version of its GoFlex Satellite, which could help its cause as a Wi-Fi mobile hotspot and server for the vehicle. And Voxx International, steward of the Audiovox and a stable of other accessory brands, maintained the time is right to launch products that include monthly fees for cellular access. These include monitoring products for people (Care Connection) and vehicles (Car Connection) as well as the Tagg pet tracker, with which it is working with Qualcomm. Sprint is the Voxx’ carrier partner for its new connected products.

Of course, even with all this activity among established and emerging device categories, this should still be a year that sees many impressive smartphone introductions. Here, though, CES must compete with two other debut stages, including CTIA, which has been pushed back to allow a bit more breathing room for handset companies, and Mobile World Congress, coming up next month in Barcelona. These two shows’ focus should provide help complete the picture of what the major consumer device lineup looks like for the year.

Next came the breakout Kindle, a new celluar device sold in many cases to consumers that lacked smartphones, but with transactions subsidizing the price of Amazon’s WhisperNet, it was again easy for Sprint, and later AT&T, to defer plan revision. But in the wake of the tablet explosion at CES this year, we’ve seen great diversity in computing devices spanning emerging and non-computing categories, with AT&T providing details for service for the PlayStation Vita launching next month, and Sprint powering a number of Audiovox products, including the Car Connection remote auto diagnostics service and Care Connect monitoring for caretakers to monitor the whereabouts of and be close at hand for those who depend on them such as kids of aging parents as well as the Tagg dog monitoring collar add-on.

The market for those who need to tear themselves away from their PS Vita to keep tabs on their cars, kids, and pets may be limited for some time, but current service pricing would dictate that they had better have some degree of disposable income as those activities would run at least $60 per month currently, even if used sporadically. And particularly for the remote monitoring products, there’s not much chance of Wi-Fi substitution to handle the job for some consumers as Connected Intelligence has seen in e-readers and tablets.

With every design win that carriers add to their portfolio of non-smartphone emerging devices, they not only move themselves closer to a potential backlash, but cut off opportunities to motivate consumers to add to their total relationship value by choosing devices that run on their networks.

Back then, multiroom audio was the exclusive domain of custom installers. But the barriers to delivering it have fallen with a variety of approaches. Many of these — like Apple’s AirPlay or Sony’s HomeShare — have been based on Wi-Fi. Others, such as the Avnera-based RocketBoost Audio products at Best Buy — use proprietary technologies to steer clear of those interference-prone networks. Sitting somewhere in the middle and continuing to grow its presence, though, is Sonos. Since adopting iPhones and iPod touches as controllers, the company has been on an aggressive push to reduce its overall system price, developing more compact and less expensive speakers such as the Play:3.

Sonos’ readiness for mass markets, though, will be tested as the company rolls out to Target stores. Two key questions will determine the success of the product that receives high accolades from its users. First will be recognition of the need for multiroom audio for which the Sonos system is built, even though the company notes that many users build their systems in stages. While my uncle may have appreciated its benefits decades ago, the applications for multiroom audio are not always readily apparent even to those who can overcome the technology.

Second is Sonos’ requirement for a bridge between the worlds of Wi-Fi and its own 5 GHz network topology. A key to the system’s ease of use and reliability, it is a minimal contrivance for a house that may have a dozen zones, but a larger part of the overall system price in a setup with only one or two zones. There’s simply a bit more to know about the Sonos system than for some high-end alarm clock that can be controlled via a smartphone.

Sprint’s time-to-market advantage, however, varied by municipality. In New York City, for example, its lead was particularly short. The Big Apple was one of the last cities in which Sprint rolled out WiMAX, but it was one of the first cities in which Verizon rolled out LTE, resulting in a head start of only a few months.

As noted in today’s press release, based on NPD Mobile Phone Track data, Sprint’s WiMAX efforts were not in vain. The carrier’s early adoption of 4G resulted in relatively high adoption of smartphones that delivered what had been the fastest wireless broadband speeds available. Indeed, Sprint was the only carrier for which 4G handset purchases accounted for the majority of unit sales. That’s particularly impressive given the relatively easier evolutionary path to 4G afforded by T-Mobile’s and AT&T’s HSPA+ networks.

Sprint notes that it will continue to offer WiMAX handsets throughout next year, which likely ensures that its WiMAX network will remain in operation for some time to come. Eventually, though, the company will be able to tap into the greater global scale afforded by LTE, scale that have proven compelling to its two larger domestic competitors.

The original Galaxy S made a splash by being introduced (although not simultaneously shipped) by all four major U.S. carriers. The Galaxy S II lineup, though, does not yet include an offering for Verizon, like the Galaxy S line did with the Samsung Fascinate. That the Verizon Galaxy S II would surface as an LTE device on that network would be in step with the line’s high-end focus.

Still, this has allowed Motorola to steal some of the spotlight with its long-promised Droid Bionic (the $299 price of which falls far below that of other bionic entities, even in 1976 dollars) as Verizon’s first dual-core LTE smartphone. But it also hints that Samsung likely has dual-core LTE smartphones in its sights, returning the challenge of Motorola’s lasting differentiation.

And speaking of the Fascinate, which was one of four brands assigned to the Galaxy S major-carrier quadruplets, it seems that this time Samsung is sticking firm to the Galaxy S name across carriers to shore up the sub-brand. To maximize the Galaxy brand impact, Samsung will have to get its Galaxy Tab 7.7 tablet, which was launched but then quickly withdrawn at IFA, back in the public eye as soon as it can.

Of course the respective motives of Motorola and the Nexus brands couldn’t be more different. Nexus phones were vanity statements, designed to show off a “pure” Android experience free of customizations. By far the most significant motivation behind the Motorola Mobility purchase was Motorola’s deep pool of patents dating back to the first cell phone.

We know how Google will seek to use – or avoid using – Motorola’s patents. What’s less clear is how Google will use Motorola’s hardware. The new parent says that the handset maker will continue to be a licensee and bid on Google projects; but its devices will play any kind of role in “supercharging” Android, per the company’s announcement blog post.

Indeed while Motorola has been a leading Android licensee, and the one that kicked off the operating system’s domestic ascent via the first Droid phone at Verizon, its long-term ability to differentiate has faced challenges. Motorola has neither the deep component supply ties of Samsung, nor HTC’s distinct visual identity (and a possible audio identity to come). Contrary to concerns that Google’s ownership may turn Motorola into a “super-licensee” who gets insider access to new Google goodies, Motorola will have to continue to justify turning Google into the accidental handset maker.

Of course Motorola Mobility also owns the largest set-top business in the U.S. As my colleague Jim Barthold has noted, the historical control that cable operators have held with vendors hardly points to an imminent infiltration of Google TV at the large pay TV providers, particularly as Google has championed the AllVid standard that cable rebukes. That the two largest U.S. cable set-top makers would now be owned by Cisco and Google — two of the biggest Internet Protocol champions — is a sign of the new infrastructure reality facing cable operators.

Of course HTC isn’t the first to try to leverage Beats’ audio enhancements to stand out in commoditized markets. Premium cable maker Monster Cable was the first major electronics brand to tap into Beats –and with great success. According to NPD’s Retail Tracking Service, Monster Cable had the highest revenue share of stereo headphones (18 percent) from July 2010 through June 2011 — up from only 2 percent two years ago. The impact of hip-hop legend Dr. Dre, of course, contributed to its success in the audio-centric category. The impact of Beats has been less clear in the fortunes of HP, which has licensed it for PCs. HP, though, has migrated Beats down from its flagship Envy line to other laptops, which signals that the license is proving its value.

HP has also included Beats audio on its recently released webOS-powered TouchPad tablet, which competes with HTC’s Flyer (also sold as the EVO View at Sprint). HTC says Beats will act as an independent subsidiary, and there’s probably no issue with HP continuing to use Beats in its PC products. But even if HP can move forward with Beats in its tablets, it seems less likely that the computing giant will be able to extend that capability to its webOS-based handsets — at least barring an HTC webOS-licensing wild card.

But how many consumers really care about the cross-compatibility of 3D glasses? According to NPD’s “3D 360 Monitor,” relatively few. In May 2011, 13 percent of consumers who identified the need to wear 3D glasses as a drawback cited glasses incompatibility as a cause for concern, a higher percentage versus last fall. And while compatibility was not cited as an objection nearly as often as price or convenience, it was on par with concerns about health.

Regarding a more imposing objection to 3D TV (at least until glasses can be eliminated completely), prices for active shutter glasses have been declining even without the establishment of a standard. With the industry’s new working group – plus rising 3D TV sales volumes, and competition from companies offering FPR displays — prices should continue to decline.

Lately, though, I’ve been looking a bit more closely at the niche space of “point-of-view” camcorders designed to capture everything from extreme sports to car races. These small but tough camcorders from GoPro, Countour, Drift Innovation, and other companies boast wide viewing angles of 135 degrees or more. While catering to a limited customer base, POV camcorders not only boast high average prices well above those of point-and-shoot camcorders, but also feature a host of margin-boosting mounts and other accessories. A fair number of customers will surely pick up multiple units to capture extreme escapades from multiple angles.

The current generation of POV camcorders currently retail for about $300, with the forthcoming Countour+ bundle set to debut at $499. That premium includes Bluetooth connectivity for previewing the capture area on a smartphone, like the Samsung SH100 or Looxcie. (Contour’s site also makes some mention of “live streaming” via HDMI via a pair of wireless connectors.) Regarding an issue that came up during a recent interview about the possibility of putting Wi-Fi inside the wafer-like iPod nano, it would be difficult to squeeze a Wi-Fi or cellular radio inside one of these compact camcorders. The GoPro Hero, though, might be able to accommodate one as a snap-on accessory, like the ones that allow consumers to see video via an LCD or even house two Hero camcorders side-by-side to capture 3D.

If a cellular connection could send back even occasional frames from a ski run while it was in progress, for example, it could surely provide critical real-time artistic feedback in some scenarios. What might be a tough-to-justify feature for today’s mainstream consumer would be much more likely to be embraced by those who live on the edge.

]]> http://www.npdgroupblog.com/2011/08/a-point-of-view-on-connected-camcorders/feed/ http://www.npdgroupblog.com/2011/07/spotify-hulu-and-the-connected-tv/ http://www.npdgroupblog.com/2011/07/spotify-hulu-and-the-connected-tv/#comments Tue, 19 Jul 2011 12:34:06 +0000 Ross Rubin, Executive Director, NPD Connected Intelligence http://www.npdgroupblog.com/?p=1308 It was once said that the U.S. arms of big music labels would never agree to support a service like Spotify. But in doing so, they have helped to produce a service far more compelling than homegrown free music download effort Spiralfrog that spiraled downward in 2009. For years Spotify and Hulu have been two of the most beloved streaming entertainment services available; however, now that Spotify is finally available stateside, the freemium music service provides an interesting contrast with Hulu.

Like Hulu, Spotify is a tiered offering (three tiers for Spotify versus two for Hulu), and both limit access both in terms of the amount of content offered as well as where it can be accessed. Unlike Hulu, Spotify makes its entire catalog available to members on the free tier, but songs can be listened to a maximum of five times; however, there is no real release window concept in music, as there is on Hulu. Both services, do require premium plans for smartphone app access. Indeed, even Spotify’s PC access requires an app, so the idea of Web access via a mobile or TV browser that has caused such browser wrangling for Hulu is moot.

Consumers may be in the dark as to why even the limited programming on Hulu’s free tier isn’t available via such living room devices as connected TVs, Blu-ray Disc players, and home consoles, but there is a clear industry rationale for doing so related to cable company retransmission fees. With Spotify that’s all but irrelevant. NPD research has shown that Pandora and Hulu Plus have both been among the most popular services on connected TVs. Pandora’s popularity is no surprise to those who have followed the popularity of cable music channels provided via MusicChoice through the years. But the early evidence is that subscription services such as Netflix and Hulu Plus have a home on connected TVs. In fact Netflix has been the most popular service, although that is due in part to its early and widespread manufacturer support.

Spotify commands a premium for its mobile experience and has required a premium subscription in its European TV implementations by Virgin Media and TeleSonera. If Spotify, free from Hulu-like MSO pressure, could offer its free tier on TVs, it would preserve its differentiation versus services like Rhapsody (which just passed 800,000 users), Napster, and Zune. For example Slacker now has its own on-demand subscription service and a smooth progression up from Internet radio that emphasizes discovery. But as the Spotify-lit spotlight has shined on Turntable.fm, Radical.fm, and other startups, we have seen that there is always another company around the corner ready to speed the evolution of the digital-music experience.