San Francisco – As usual the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) Fall Forum luncheon was stuffed with a variety of news items including a vote on its new executive board members, a keynote speech by the founder of Reddit, and an update from
president/CEO Gary Shapiro.
In his remarks Shapiro projected CE industry manufacturer shipments coming in 6 percent higher this year, to $200 billion, with another 4 percent gain expected for 2013.
Shapiro added that CEA added 460 new members this year, and announced the formation of the 4K Ultra TV working group, under the chairmanship of Gary Yacoubian of Specialty Technologies/SVSound, to plan how the industry will promote this new format.
Shapiro also announced that he has authored a second book, called “Ninja Innovation,” which chronicles 10 killer strategies from the world’s most successful technology companies. It will debut at International CES in January.
The 2013 slate of CEA executive board and Industry Leaders was announced during the lunch, with Jay McLellan of Home Automation, Inc. becoming chairman of CEA on Jan. 1, replacing Randy Fry of Fry’s Electronics, who remains on the executive board as past chair.
Pat Lavelle of Voxx International has been named vice-chairman.
Alexis Ohanian, co-founder of Reddit, regaled the luncheon audience, discussing his involvement in defeating the anti-Internet SOFA and PIPA legislation that was before Congress earlier this year, the Internet Freedom bus tour from Denver to St. Louis, his path from the first presidential debate to the vice-presidential debate, to talk Internet freedom and to highlight successful web startups from the Rockies to the Midwest.
In one of Ohanian’s many quotable quotes, he said, “While the world is round … the world wide web is flat! We need a level playing field for entrepreneurs to thrive … now and in the future.”
