news
EZViz’s Mini Trooper Is An Indoor/Outdoor Security Solution
EZViz has broadened its lineup of smart-home security devices with the addition of the Mini Trooper camera. Featuring a wire-free design that’s meant for...
news
Computers
Lenovo’s Laptops Of The Future Are Flexible & Curvy
On the eve of the 25th anniversary of ThinkPad this fall, Lenovo rolled into New York last week for a global B-to-B conference that...
Home Automation
Sure To Debut Universal Remote App With Voice Command Capability At Mobile World Congress
Sure Universal, which markets a smartphone-based universal remote app, has added Amazon’s Alexa voice control to its capabilities. The company will debut the updated...
Audio
Riva Audio Ships WAND Multiroom Wireless Speakers
Rikki Farr knows how good music should sound, perhaps better than anyone else alive. As a club manager, concert and festival promoter, and music...
Audio/Video
Cobra’s IP 200 Dash Cam With Motion Detection Now Available
Cobra Electronics has begun shipping its newest dash cam, the Instant Proof (IP) 200. A windshield-mounted camera, the IP 200 records 1080p video with...
news
As Apple Marks A Milestone, iPhone 8 Could Be A Victim Of Its Own Success
In three days the world will mark the 10th anniversary of Apple’s first-ever iPhone. Or at least it should. Most owners don’t give their...
Car Electronics
Voxx International Sells Off Hirschmann Car Group
Voxx International has entered into a definitive agreement to sell its Hirschmann Car Communication group to a subsidiary of TE Connectivity. Hirschmann, which Voxx...
Appliances
Sharp Butters Up Microwave Market With Orville Redenbacher Popcorn Setting
Updated!Sharp Home Electronics Company of America (SHCA) has sharpened its merchandising with a trio of stainless-steel countertop microwave ovens that feature dedicated settings for...
Buying Groups
ProSource Partners With Roon Labs
ProSource, the specialty buying group for A/V dealers and integrators, has partnered with Roon Labs to drive market adoption of the developer’s all-inclusive player...
news
Mohu’s Leaf Glide Antenna Gives Cord Cutters More Range With Less Work
Mohu unveiled its latest solution for cord cutters, the Leaf Glide HDTV indoor antenna. Designed to bring the same range of outdoor antennas right...
news
Sears Layoffs Included Online President Stephan Zoll, Shop Your Way SVP Eric Jaffe
Updated! Two top Sears Holdings executives whose functions are key to the retailer’s core multichannel shopping strategy were included in a corporate downsizing earlier...
news
Sears Opens Appliance/Mattress Specialty Store
Sears has opened a new-format specialty store devoted to appliances and mattresses. The freestanding showroom, located in Pharr, Texas, builds on the success of...
Accessories
Sony Aims For STEM Education With Koov Building Blocks
Add Sony to the list of the companies that want to make computing coding as easy as snapping Legos together. Sony’s global education unit,...
news
LG Unveils 77-Inch Flexible, Transparent OLED Display
LG has been raising eyebrows with its flexible, rollable OLED displays for several years, and it raised the bar just a little higher this...
news
Anatomy Of A Smartphone Launch: OnePlus 5 Takes Manhattan
For those not in the smartphone know, OnePlus is to handsets what T-Mobile is carriers. While neither company is undercapitalized (OnePlus is an affiliate...
Home Automation
LG, Samsung Launch Out-Of-This-World Connected Campaigns
Two of the top purveyors of smart appliances have launched new campaigns to tout their visions for the connected kitchen. For LG Electronics, the...
Industry
Changes At The Top: Whirlpool’s Jeff Fettig And GE Appliances’ Chip Blankenship Stepping Down
The CEOs of two of the world’s largest major appliance manufacturers are handing off the reins. In back-to-back announcements, Whirlpool’s Jeff Fettig and GE...
news
Wearables Should Remain On Retailers’ Radar
The wearables category, while not setting the consumer technology industry on fire as was predicted by many, is growing at a healthier pace than...
Distributors
D&H Adds VR Gaming Focus To Summer Tech Show
D&H Distributing will return to the Hershey Lodge and Convention Center in where else but Hershey, Pa., for its annual Mid-Atlantic Summer Technology Trade...
news
Danby To Dealers: hhgregg’s Pain Is Independents’ Gain
Don’t get Jim Estill wrong. The CEO of compact appliance resource Danby finds no joy in hhgregg’s dissolution. But that’s not to say you...
Appliances
These Are The 10 Top-Performing Refrigerator Brands Online
Quick, think of the top 10 refrigerator brands. Now guess which ones lead the pack online. They may not necessarily be the same. To...
news
Samsung Offers Preview Of Bixby Voice-Command Assistant To Galaxy S8 Owners
Samsung announced it will offer select Galaxy S8 and S8+ owners in the U.S. early access to its Bixby artificial-intelligence-based voice-command technology. Galaxy S8...
news
Organic Apple
Apple’s recent measured plunge into the voice-controlled smart speaker market went as most analysts expected. As usual, Apple sat on the sidelines and watched...
Industry
The Year Ahead In Gaming
1Xbox One X: Microsoft’s Project Scorpio was the only brand-new video game system from the three major console makers to be shown for the...
news
The Connected Home Market
In the span of a few short years, connected devices have entered the homes of millions of Americans, and are now poised for a...
Accessories
Monster’s Heavy-Hitting ‘Sound of Champions’
Monster’s newest marketing campaign has officially begun, its start marked with a high-profile partnership with Roc Nation Sports. The audio manufacturer’s “Sound of Champions”...
news
Batter Up: NRF Swings Away At Border Tax Proposal
The National Retail Federation (NRF) condemned a proposal by House Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady (R-TX) to phase in a Border Adjustment Tax...
news
Whose Brand Is It Anyway? Behind The Hisense/Sharp Skirmish
Two years into a five-year licensing deal, Sharp is looking to reclaim its premium TV badge from Hi-sense and has filed suit in two...
news
Consumers Spent $1.8B On Father’s Day Tech
U.S. consumers were expected to lavish about $1.8 billion in electronics and computer-related wares on their husbands and dads this past Father’s Day, up...
news
Sprint’s Joint With Dixons Is No More
Sprint and Dixons Carphone, the European mobile and CE chain, have agreed to end their 50-50 retail partnership in the U.S. Under the two-year-old...
news
Sales Associates Feel They Are Under-Equipped To Sell
A new poll of retail sales associates suggests that their customer engagement and job satisfaction would improve if given the proper digital tools and...
news
Nationwide’s Plan To Siphon Sears, hhgregg Shoppers
The Nationwide Marketing Group is stepping up its share-grab efforts with a new marketing campaign designed to snatch up stray Sears and hhgregg customers....
Appliances
3 Rather Large Peas In An Appliance Pod
For a relatively staid category like white goods, there’s been plenty of volatility on TWICE’s Top 50 Major Appliances Report. Indeed, it was only...
news
How Walmart Is Thinking Outside The (Big) Box
In its quest to catch up with Amazon and leverage its big-box real estate, Walmart is testing a host of retail innovations that embrace...
news
Viken Helps Hisense Make Its Mark
Mark Viken may be the marketing VP for Hisense USA, a relatively new TV badge to these shores, but he’s no newcomer to the...
Appliances
Zephyr Turns 20
Happy birthday, Zephyr Ventilation. The premium range hood business, which melded fashion and functionality to help raise the category beyond its utilitarian roots, celebrates...
news
TWICE Top 25 CE E-tailers Report: Online Sales Soar For Top Dealers
Fueled by e-commerce investments that could rival some Third World GDPs, the country’s largest pure-play and multichannel tech dealers enjoyed another double-digit online sales...
news
Sales Slipping? You Can Thank ‘Persistent Discounting’
The nation’s CE and appliance dealers registered a cumulative 1.8 percent decline in May sales year over year, to $8.1 billion, the U.S. Census...
Accessories
Anki’s Cozmo Shows Potential Of Smart-Toy Market
While the smart-toy consumer is sure to mature with age, the market for these connected toys is another story. According to Juniper Research, the...
news
We’ve Seen The Future Of The Smart Home, And It Is Bright
New research paints a rosy picture for the road to the smart home. Home-automation products will add $1.8 billion of new CE sales through...
News
Harvesting The Fruits Of A Luxury Audio Partnership
Origin Acoustics, which recently began shipping the latest lux audio fruits of its partnership with Bang & Oluf-sen, has refreshed its Director and LCR...
news
Apple’s HomePod Could Be The Smart Home’s Rising Tide
Apple’s annual WWDC is less a consumer event than a chance to set the stage for the new items announced throughout the rest of...