Volume 10, Issue 13 — July 11, 2019

UCC — Volume 11, Issue 13 — July 11, 2019

July 11, 2019 | Volume: 11 | Issue: 13

This week, Biamp bought the parent company that owns Community Loudspeakers and Apart Audio — an interesting purchase. Gary Kayye has a unique take on the acquisition, which you can read below — he thinks Biamp is heading in the same direction as QSC.

Dr. Fred Ampel also stands on his soapbox and rants a bit about standards in the industry, with his amusingly-titled column, Is It a Standard If Nobody Uses It? I recently wrote and compiled a lengthy standards guideline document for advertising in digital signage (DOOH), so I feel his pain. (Read it here! It’s totally free!) But I did appreciate the opportunity to use my favorite xkcd comic.

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-Sara Abrons

COLUMNS

+ Why in the Heck Would Biamp Buy Community and Apart Audio? Hint: QSC [Gary Kayye]

Biamp CEO Rashid Skaf came from AMX — remember them? At one time, AMX was not only the second-largest control system company on earth but, they were also a full-service turnkey provider of AV room systems, switching and accessories — this was all under Rashid’s watch; then he left. AMX has floundered since. QSC has filled the AMX void with its Q-SYS control platform and a full line of room switching and signal management products. Although not number two, like AMX once was — fourth behind Crestron, Extron and Kramer — Rashid aims to rip away the QSC momentum.

+ Is It a Standard if Nobody Uses it? [Dr. Frederick Ampel]

The AV/IT industry has a problem, one of its own making and one that is getting worse by the micro-second. There are just too many conflicting and confusing “standards” and best practices. Between those created by trade groups, those developed by technical associations or technology consortia (worse yet as these tend to be proprietary) and the flavor variations created by various international overlays on existing standards, the pile of paper is beginning to reach the size of a major mountain range in height.

+ AV Industry EOL: Planned Obsolescence (Part Two) [Anthony Coppedge]

Even the IT industry, with many patterns and best practices, does not set a minimum standard for end-of-life (EOL) for IT gear. However, the IT industry does have a history of creating practical frameworks for creating sustainable Service Level Agreements (SLAs) such as ITIL and ISO/IEC 20000. It follows, then, that the AV industry could do the same, a point I've made before.

+ Software Is Eating AV [Andrew Davis]

In 10 years or less, what was once the AV industry is going to be a be a footnote in the history of business technology, somewhere among the overhead projector and the fax machine. This hardware-centric industry we call home, this perpetual contest of who sells both the biggest and smallest piece of electronics will make way for software-defined AV (SDAV). It is inevitable. If you are already rolling your eyes, please do yourself a favor and pay close attention to what happens next.

+ My (Belated) InfoComm Review [Mark Coxon]

Even with all the things I missed, I still got tremendous value out of the show. I was able to teach on a topic I am passionate about, the "why" behind AV and how it works on a human level. I was able to do a fireside chat-style workshop where we made some very personal connections. I was able to meet some people in real life that I only knew online and form deeper relationships with them. I was able to meet with people on the strategy level to discuss ways to drive business and develop new business models.