By Gary Kayye, CTS
So, on to the InfoComm news – but first some comments and observations from the show floor: First of all, this was NOT a small show. Contrary to popular belief, pre-show, people DID show up. In fact, not only were nearly 30,000 people at the show, but it was also the largest attendance ever for an east coast InfoComm venue – in a down market. There’s no question that attendance among end-users was down – and many manufacturers cut their trade show booth staff, too, but integrators and design consultants all attended. It’s a good sign for the upcoming year.
Second, there were a lot of new technologies at the show. All of the standouts will be covered in Parts 1 & 2 of our InfoComm coverage issues, but some personal favorites were Extron’s touch panels for their MediaLink system (called TouchLink), Spudnik’s private demo of their laser-based display technology, Lencore’s IP-based sound masking demo, a killer Holographic demo from Illusio (you gotta stop right now and watch this – the three guys on stage were there holographically with rAVe’s Sara Abrons – even without audio, this demo is cool), and Christie DS+750 projector. Of course, there are others, but these are just a few.
Oh, and not only did Da-Lite’s Affinity screen technology win the NEC InfoComm Product of the Show award, but they donated the $25,000 prize (and matched it!) to InfoComm’s Educational Foundation! Kudos to NEC for sponsoring that award, and kudos to Da-Lite for both winning the award and donating all that money to ICIF. You can watch Da-Lite president Rich Lundin’s acceptance of the award here.