Talk to enough people in the AV industry, and you will find broad agreement on one thing: the word AI has been stretched so far it has lost most of its meaning. Automation gets called AI. Rule-based alerting gets called AI. A chatbot bolted onto a monitoring dashboard gets called AI. The enthusiasm is understandable since the technology is genuinely moving fast, but the labeling has gotten ahead of reality, and the industry knows it.

But let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater. We should question inflated claims, but we should also be willing to recognize where AI can genuinely add value. Especially when it comes to operational intelligence, because the accountability gap between AV, IT, and the network is exactly where AI delivers.

Platforms Everywhere, But the Complete Picture is Missing

InfoComm 2026 made clear that the industry has moved on from boxes. A decade ago, the conversation was about whether AV over IP would work. Today, the question is how platforms work together. Every major vendor now has a management layer: room control platforms, audio networking platforms, collaboration platforms, AV management platforms. The market has answered the device fragmentation problem of the last decade by building around software and platforms rather than hardware and point products. That is the right direction.

A New Problem Has Been Created

Each platform sees its own slice of the environment. The collaboration platform knows whether the call is live. The control system knows whether the display is on. The audio platform knows whether the DSP is responding. The network switch knows whether the port is up. But none of them, individually, can tell you why the room is not working. Craig Durr, Chief Analyst and founder of The Collab Collective, put it plainly after walking the InfoComm floor: the single-pane-of-glass pitch, he observed, usually just aggregates noise into one place. That is the "phantomization" problem in a sentence.

The Accountability Gap

When something fails in a converged AV environment, the investigation must cross platform boundaries that no single tool was designed to span. IT owns the network. AV owns the experience. The collaboration platform vendor owns their stack. When something fails, the executive audience does not care which layer caused the issue. They only know the stream glitched, the room did not work, or the CEO could not be heard.

That gap, the space between platforms where operational problems live, is the specific challenge that AI in AV needs to address to be worth the name. Not AI that adds a feature to an existing platform. AI that sits above the platforms and reasons across all of them. Durr's observation from the show floor cuts to it directly: "Monitoring was never the job. Resolution is."

What the Network Sees

The network is the connective tissue between every platform in the room. It is also the layer that most operational AI in AV does not cover. Magic in the room, boring on the network. That is still the goal. But boring depends on active intelligence, not passive infrastructure.

The root cause of an AV failure is often not in the device layer at all. It is upstream: a VLAN misconfiguration, a port that dropped, a Quality of Service (QoS) policy that changed. Even though every platform reports green, the room does not work. Without network-layer visibility, the investigation stays manual, and the blame game thrives.

That is one of the reasons NETGEAR partners with companies like Utelogy, Providius, XYTE, and NetSpeek. We believe network-layer visibility belongs inside the AI's operational context, not alongside it. These kinds of platforms are going to use an AI-native AV operations product to treat the network as a first-class data source.

The industry solved device fragmentation by moving to platforms. That was the right answer to the right problem. The next problem is both holistic and operational: how do you manage an environment that no single platform can fully see? That is the question AI in AV should be answering. When it does, it earns its name.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Jim Kidwell, Principal Product Marketing Manager at Audinate

From boardrooms to live concert arenas, AV-over-IP has brought incredible flexibility to AV systems in almost every application. Now that cloud-based solutions have come to the AV world, the decision about when and how to use them should be part of the discussion. Multiple companies, including Audinate with Dante Director and Dante Director Professional, now offer management and monitoring applications that provide superior insights into AV networks, in effect elevating AV systems into the professional IT space. These management solutions are worth considering, as they offer new capabilities for remote device management that can positively affect your daily customer service and support.

Where the cloud is still evolving is the full adoption of production-based workflows hosted entirely in the cloud. Mature solutions for professional broadcast, such as Grass Valley’s AMPP, can provide a fully realized cloud-based broadcast production environment with hardware connectivity, including Dante audio.

Moving production environments into the cloud is a bit of an internal accounting shift for many organizations. It may no longer include as much capital expenditure up front, but will have higher operational expenses as you utilize cloud production systems. This is a shift that can have real financial benefits, as you only pay for the systems when you are actively using them. So, with some up-front budgetary planning, organizations can effectively shift their accounting and make systems more cost-effective and flexible when needed.

A few weeks ago, while doing some research, I came across a Harvard Business Review article titled “Welcome to the Experience Economy” by B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore.

Turns out I was reading an article authored in 1998.

In technology terms, 1998 feels like another world. Before smartphones. Before cloud collaboration. Before hybrid work. And certainly, before AI became part of the daily operating vocabulary of almost every organization.

Yet what struck me was not how outdated the article felt, but how relevant its underlying logic of value still was.

The article explored two ideas that feel particularly important to this moment.

The first is the progression of economic value—from commodities, to goods, to services, and ultimately to experiences. As markets mature, each layer of value becomes more vulnerable to standardization and commoditization. What was once differentiated becomes easier to compare. So the opportunity for value has to keep moving upward, toward experiences that are more personal, more memorable, more relevant, and harder to reduce to a line item.

The second idea is more commercial, but just as important. Pine and Gilmore argue that companies reveal a great deal about the business they are really in by what they actually charge for. I think the end-user version of that question is equally important: if what we charge for reveals what we value, then what are you actually willing (and able) to pay for?

Those two ideas stayed with me because I believe they ask uncomfortable questions of the enterprise collaboration space in this moment.

The Experience Proposition

For years, the AV and collaboration industry has spoken the language of experience; moving from products to solutions, from systems to services, from rooms to outcomes, and from technology to workplace experience.

Yet, if we are honest, we have moved further in the opposite direction. We talked about outcomes, but optimized for standards. We talked about workplace experience, but bought and sold around equipment, deployment, support, and refresh. We talked about delivering strategic value while creating efficient operational and commercial models.

There were, of course, valid reasons for those strategies at the time. As standardization became the dominant operating principle of enterprise AV, the goal was to create confidence that had been lost in these spaces in the past.

From a user standpoint, could people walk into a room and know what to do? Would the call connect? Would content share? And from a management standpoint, could support teams manage hundreds or thousands of spaces without being overwhelmed by variation?

Personalization, Adaptability, and Differentiation

Today’s AI age, however, makes that contradiction much harder to ignore. While AI can certainly further accelerate commoditization—making the familiar easier, faster, and cheaper to deliver—it also offers the potential for incredible new levels of personalization, adaptability, and differentiation.

Pine and Gilmore’s article reminds us of something uncomfortable. In the experience economy, consistency is not the highest form of value; it is the foundation on which higher value can be created.

Consistency may prevent disappointment, but it is not inspiring. It does not exceed expectations. It does not create the energy, memory, momentum, or meaningful differentiation that anchor exceptional experiences and outcomes.

A reliable room prevents failure.

A remarkable meeting creates value because people came together.

So, if we are talking about “experience” in enterprise collaboration, what experience are we really pursuing? Is it simply reliability and predictability? Or is it, indeed, can it become something far more connected to the purpose of gathering itself?

Let’s stay with that for a moment.

When we borrow the word “experience,” it is easy to imagine theatre, hospitality, immersive design, or event production. Great events are designed around attention, energy, resonance, memory, and motivation to act. They take enormous amounts of preparation and planning, but deliver returns to justify that effort.

Most enterprise meetings will never justify months of planning or event-level production, nor should they. They operate at a different scale. But the objective is not as different as we might think. Our events brethren understand something enterprise collaboration often underplays: just bringing people together is not enough.

So, in meeting or learning environments, the future question should not only be whether the technology simply equips the meeting. It should be whether the environment, and the experience it creates, actually increases the value of gathering.

Here’s an analogy that may help picture one example of that potential future more tangibly.

A great Executive Assistant (EA) is, in many ways, an experience enabler. They anticipate and proactively prepare. They understand context and act in response. They remove friction before it appears. They recall individual preferences and priorities, and add small but resonant touches. They help executives show up better than they would have otherwise.

Great EAs create exceptional experiences because they consistently exceed others' expectations in how well they proactively enable better outcomes.

An AI-Powered Collaboration?

So what if, powered by the increasingly intelligent and human-aware technology capabilities of AI, collaboration environments were architected in the future to behave less like passive containers and more like spaces equipped with trusted and proactive executive assistants?

What if they understood the purpose of the meeting? What if they could sense signals, understand initial objectives, help adjust the room to the activity, leverage and react to real-time context, quickly assemble additional supporting data or reach out to additional parties to contribute. To take collaboration infrastructure from merely operational enablement to something more.

Would that be something worth paying for?

To be clear, I am not suggesting completely abandoning the commoditisation-driven path overnight in a market still struggling to break free of that. But it cannot be the only path.

The actionable path ahead is not only about how your organization completely rewrites the foundations of every RFP (yet). But it is about more actively thinking about how you create some permissions, incentives, structures, and rewards that allow the market to explore something more valuable with you.

The more practical short-term opportunity is to run two collaboration strategies at once. Keep optimizing what is known, though with a new eye to future risk mitigation and objectives. But in parallel, begin to create another protected lane that enables you to actively explore what is becoming possible.

>> That may begin with a pilot, a different partner conversation, or a small proof of concept.

>> It may mean exploring ways to effectively understand and measure meeting impact and outcome.

>> Perhaps creating a shared risk/reward model that allows both customer and provider to baseline, refine, and prove it before the proposition is fully mature.

>> It may also mean broadening the voices in the strategy & planning room beyond traditional collaboration technology stakeholders to include voices who understand the likes of human behaviour, learning, culture, facilitation, organizational change, and how people actually create value together.

The right balances will be specific to your role, your organization’s structures, and ultimately your organization’s ability to embrace AI transformation generally and the “future of collaboration” opportunity specifically. But foundationally, there must be a recognition that organizations cannot procure their way into that future of collaboration if their processes only reward the commoditized providers they already know how to compare.

The question in this moment is not whether your organization can yet deliver the remarkable meeting of the future today. It is whether the decisions being made today increase your ability to pursue it tomorrow. That future will not be defined only by what AI technically makes possible. It will be defined by what organizations decide is worth valuing.

Perhaps that is why a nearly 30-year-old article still matters. It reminds us that technology may keep changing the tools, but value still returns to something deeply human: what people notice, what they remember, what they trust, what helps them, and what they believe was worth more than just what it costs.

For the enterprise collaboration space, generally, AI now forces a choice. Either collaboration becomes even more commoditised as the market gets faster, more automated, and easier to compare. Or the industry, in part at least, led by end-user organizations prepared to value something more, truly redefines its definition of experience around the outcomes people actually gather to create.

That is the move from pursuing reliable rooms to enabling remarkable meetings!

Not simply better spaces, but better reasons to believe that gathering was worth it.

Situational awareness across defense, public safety, and emergency response operations is built on one critical resource: timely access to accurate visual information. Whether it is an unmanned aircraft surveying a contested environment, a helicopter supporting search-and-rescue operations, or a drone monitoring the spread of a wildfire, video has become one of the most valuable sources of operational intelligence.

But raw video alone is not enough. The value of video lies in how quickly it can be delivered, processed, interpreted, and acted upon. Behind every mission-critical video feed is a complex ecosystem of technologies responsible for encoding, transporting, transcoding, and displaying video across networks that may be bandwidth-constrained, unreliable, or contested. This increases the need for edge-based technologies, which operate directly in the field, closest to where events are unfolding, where timely situational awareness is most critical and connectivity to centralized processing or analysis cannot always be guaranteed.

As missions become more complex and the number of video sources continues to grow, the industry is increasingly turning to AI to help transform video from a passive stream of imagery into actionable insight. When applied correctly, AI enhances existing video workflows; enabling more accurate interpretation, reducing cognitive load on operators, and helping teams focus on the information that matters most.

A Growing Role

Video has become central to modern defense and civilian operations, which increasingly rely on edge‑based personnel to process and act on real‑time video insights even when connectivity to central systems is limited.

In military and defense operations, full-motion video from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), manned aircraft, and ground-based systems provides commanders with real-time insight into evolving situations. These feeds allow teams to monitor troop movements, identify potential threats, and coordinate responses across multiple operational units. At the edge, forward‑deployed teams, UAV operators, and tactical analysts rely on immediate, locally processed video to make rapid decisions under dynamic and high‑risk conditions.

Public safety agencies rely on similar capabilities. Police departments integrate video from helicopters, drones, fixed surveillance systems, and body‑worn cameras to support investigations and real‑time incident management in the field. Fire departments increasingly deploy aerial drones during wildfire response to assess fire behavior, track fire lines, and identify potential risks to firefighters on the ground. Search-and-rescue teams also use aerial video to expand coverage across vast terrain, monitoring these feeds for visual clues that might otherwise go unnoticed from the ground.

What these scenarios share is a reliance on real-time video transport and edge-based processing. Video must move quickly and securely from the field to command and tactical operations centers (TOCs), often across multiple networks and systems. The workflows behind these operations must accommodate different video formats, varying bandwidth availability, and multiple viewing destinations simultaneously.

Video encoders compress and prepare feeds for transmission. Transcoders adapt those streams to different network conditions or viewing platforms. Players and visualization systems allow operators to view, analyze, and share information in real time.

These components work together to ensure that decision makers receive the video they need when they need it. However, as the number of video sources grows, so does the complexity of processing and interpreting them—and in environments where connectivity may be intermittent or constrained, edge processing can make the difference between receiving actionable information in seconds versus minutes.

Video Overload

Operators working in mission-critical environments are often tasked with monitoring multiple video feeds simultaneously. In some operations centers, teams may oversee dozens of live streams at once. During field operations, where fewer video feeds are typically available, the reduced number of video feeds create increased pressure on quick, yet accurate, decision making.

This is where AI is starting to play a bigger role. AI can analyze visual data in real time as well as identify objects or activities, so teams can make faster decisions or use the information later to spot patterns and support investigations. AI-powered video analysis introduces several capabilities that significantly improve how mission-critical video is used.

Object Detection and Recognition: One of the most widely used video-based AI capabilities is object detection using computer vision algorithms. AI models can automatically identify and classify objects within a video stream, such as vehicles, individuals, vessels, or aircraft. Instead of reviewing entire recordings, analysts can quickly locate moments where specific events occurred.

AI‑enabled video analysis enhances mission-critical operations across defense, public safety, and search-and-rescue by rapidly identifying key elements within live or recorded imagery. For example, in military reconnaissance, automated detection can flag even hard-to-see vehicle movement within a surveillance zone, eliminating the need to manually scan hours of footage. During wildfire response, the same capabilities help identify hotspots, vehicles, or structures, giving incident commanders faster insight into emerging risks. For search-and-rescue teams, AI can highlight potential human figures in aerial imagery, dramatically reducing search time in sea rescues, difficult terrain, or other low‑visibility environments.

Metadata Enrichment: AI also enhances video workflows through a process called structured observation management (SOM), which generates additional metadata such as image chips of detected objects, timestamps, geographic coordinates, or movement vectors. When combined with traditional video metadata, it creates a richer data environment that allows operators to search, filter, and analyze video more effectively.

Pattern Recognition and Behavioral Analysis (GEOINT AI): Geospatial intelligence artificial intelligence (GEOINT AI) is the National Geospatial Agency's term for utilizing SOM to enable analysis of patterns and behaviors within geospatial data, including video. For example, a vehicle repeatedly circling a location or an object moving against expected traffic patterns may indicate a situation that requires closer investigation. These capabilities are particularly valuable in large-scale monitoring operations where the environment is constantly changing.

Balancing AI with Security

Another important shift in mission-critical video workflows is the movement of AI processing closer to the edge. In many deployments, this intelligence runs directly on field-deployed encoding systems mounted on vehicles, aircraft, or portable command units.

Rugged edge devices, such as the Haivision Kraken X1 Rugged video processing appliance, illustrate how modern video encoders are increasingly designed not only to encode and transport video reliably, but also to support processing capabilities that help reduce bandwidth requirements and accelerate situational insight. This approach reduces network load while enabling faster insights for operators.

By performing object detection before transmission, systems can prioritize sending only the most relevant information. In many cases, full-motion video no longer needs to traverse constrained networks. Instead, detections, including cropped images of detected objects and metadata, are transmitted to inform which streams should be prioritized for further review.

Despite the clear benefits of AI in video workflows, security remains a primary concern in many mission-critical environments. Defense organizations and public safety agencies often operate under strict requirements governing how information is processed, transmitted, and stored.

The good news is that modern AI implementations do not require data to leave secure environments. AI models can be deployed locally within trusted infrastructure, whether in mobile edge devices, tactical systems, or secured data centers, ensuring sensitive video content remains within controlled networks.

Additionally, AI processing can occur without the need to permanently store video. Systems can analyze incoming footage in real time to generate operational metadata, then discard the raw frames once processing is complete. This approach allows organizations to extract AI-driven insights while reducing data duplication and maintaining strict control over sensitive information.

Encryption, authentication, and secure video transport protocols remain essential components of these workflows. AI should enhance operational capabilities without introducing new vulnerabilities.

Operational Intelligence

The role of video in mission-critical operations will only continue to grow. As drones, sensors, and connected systems become more widely deployed, the volume of available visual data will expand dramatically.

AI will play a key role in helping organizations manage this scale. Rather than simply delivering video from point A to point B, modern video workflows are evolving into intelligent systems capable of analyzing, prioritizing, and contextualizing visual information.

The goal is not to replace human expertise, but to ensure that operators receive the right information at the right moment. In high-stakes environments where decisions must be made quickly, that difference can be critical. By combining real-time video transport with AI-driven analysis, mission-critical organizations are moving closer to a future where situational awareness is not limited by the volume of available data but enhanced by it.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Jonathan Gryckiewicz, Business Development Director, Cloud Solutions at Ross Video

Cloud-based AV is reshaping how organizations produce, manage, and distribute video content. One of the biggest trends driving adoption is the convergence of traditional Pro AV with broadcast-quality production. Companies now expect executive town halls, virtual events, and internal communications to deliver the same polished experience audiences see in professional broadcasts. Cloud-enabled workflows help organizations achieve this by supporting remote production, centralized control, and scalable collaboration across teams and locations.

Another major trend is the shift from hardware-focused systems to workflow-focused environments. Modern AV strategies are less about purchasing standalone equipment and more about building flexible ecosystems that integrate production, automation, streaming, and content management. Cloud infrastructure allows organizations to scale resources as needed, reduce reliance on large, on-premises systems, and deploy updates or new capabilities more efficiently.

The benefits are significant. Cloud-based AV environments improve operational flexibility, enable remote collaboration, and help organizations respond faster to changing production demands. IP-based and software-defined workflows also support scalability, allowing companies to expand capabilities without rebuilding entire infrastructures. For many organizations, this can lower long-term operational costs while improving agility and system resilience.

However, there are important cautions. Cloud AV depends heavily on reliable network infrastructure, bandwidth, and cybersecurity. Without proper planning, organizations can face latency, interoperability, or reliability issues that impact live productions and user experience. Vendor lock-in is another growing concern, making open standards and interoperable platforms increasingly important when evaluating long-term AV strategies.

Ultimately, successful cloud AV adoption requires more than simply moving technology online. Organizations that focus on workflow design, scalability, and long-term operational strategy will be best positioned to maximize the benefits of cloud-based production and collaboration.

One week after the news of two brand new CEOs at Adder Technology and Epiphan Video, M&W Pro Audio introduced a new CEO of its own. There were also strategic appointments from Chyron, Korbyt, Visionarty, and Hai Robotics, while NSCA welcome new executive leadership to its board.

[The SCN July Issue Is Here: Dive Into an AI Future]

Missed it? Don't worry. As always, get caught up on the week that was in your Monday dose of Pro AV Newsmakers.

Chyron Strengthens Middle East Presence with Appointment of Ahmed Magd

Chyron recently appointed Ahmed Magd as sales director for the Middle East. Magd comes to Chyron with a strong leadership and live video production background, including previous senior commercial roles at Riedel Communications, Clear-Com, and Al Masa IT Distribution. His experience encompasses distributor and reseller management, key client relationships, and cross-border business development initiatives.

With almost two decades of experience in broadcast and media technology, Magd is responsible for driving Chyron's growth strategy across the Middle East, strengthening relationships with customers and partners, and helping broadcasters leverage Chyron's solutions for graphics, sports production, newsroom operations, and live content creation. Magd has a strong reputation for driving business growth, expanding partner ecosystems, and establishing market leadership in highly competitive environments.

Hai Robotics Expands Americas Leadership

Hai Robotics has appointed two senior executives to its Americas leadership team: Alan Berstein as general manager, Latin America (LATAM) and Paul Pendleton as VP of delivery.

Berstein leads Hai Robotics' growth and expansion strategy throughout Latin America while strengthening support for customers and partners across the region. He is responsible for building and scaling the regional team, expanding market presence, and ensuring customers have access to the resources and expertise needed to maximize the value of their automation investments.

Pendleton leads the end-to-end delivery of Hai Robotics' warehouse automation deployments across the Americas, overseeing delivery strategy, execution, talent development, customer satisfaction, and operational performance. Pendleton joins Hai Robotics with extensive experience leading large-scale automation programs and complex industrial projects for enterprise customers

TJ Waldorf Appointed SVP of Marketing at Korbyt

Korbyt appointed TJ Waldorf as SVP of Marketing. He brings more than two decades of experience leading go-to-market strategy for high-growth SaaS organizations, including leadership roles with several private equity-backed enterprise SaaS companies.

Most recently, Waldorf served as CMO at 1WorldSync, where he helped triple annual recurring revenue (ARR), expand the company’s global marketing organization and played a key role in its acquisition by Syndigo. Throughout his career, he has led marketing transformations, product launches and revenue growth initiatives across enterprise technology companies.

M&W Pro Audio Names Phillip Bunch as Chief Executive Officer

M&W Pro Audio has appointed Phil Bunch as chief executive officer. Bunch brings extensive professional audio manufacturing, operations, executive leadership, and global supply chain experience to the company. Bunch joined M&W Pro Audio immediately prior to the company's worldwide debut at the recent InfoComm trade show in Las Vegas, where M&W introduced its first two products, the D24 and D32 digital mixers. SCN covered the company's arrival here: Pro AV Newsmakers: Introducing M&W Pro Audio.

Prior to stepping into the new role at M&W Pro Audio, Bunch previously served for eight years as VP of global operations at Tectonic Audio Labs. He was previously the longtime president of Phase Group, where he has been responsible for overseeing the company's operations across its QA and engineering services, automation, supply chain management, and procurement divisions. Additionally, Bunch has held senior leadership positions at Eastech and Esoteric Audio, overseeing engineering, product development, manufacturing, quality, procurement, and global supply chain organizations throughout Asia and North America.

NSCA Welcomes New Leadership

NSCA announced the election of new officers to its board of directors for 2026-2027. Shedan Maghzi, strategic advisor at Avidex and current NSCA treasurer, assumed the role of president on July 1, 2026.

Maghzi replaces Dale Bottcher, who is chief revenue officer at AVI-SPL. Bottcher will serve as NSCA’s immediate past president, replacing Dan Schmidtendorff, president and CEO at Communication Company.

Don Mastro, chief revenue officer at FORTÉ and current NSCA secretary, will become NSCA vice president; Chris Wasp Jr., CEO at Ronco, will be named NSCA treasurer. Christina De Bono, president at ClearTech Media, will return to her role as NSCA secretary after most recently serving as NSCA vice president.

As Wasp Jr. leaves the board to join the executive team, and Laurie MacKeigan, president at Backman Vidcom, steps down after fulfilling her three-year term, two new board members joined for the 2026-2027 term: Dawn Cagliano, president at IVCi and 2026 SCN Hall of Famer, and Brandon Conick, COO at CTI. It was originally announced during the 2026 Business and Leadership Conference that Valley Communications Systems CEO Michael Tremble would join the board of directors, but a series of mergers and acquisitions forced NSCA’s Leadership Development Committee to develop a new plan. Tremble will remain co-chair of NSCA’s Business and Leadership Conference Planning Committee.

Visionary Appoints Phillip Cordell as VP of Marketing

Visionary Solutions appointed Phillip Cordell as VP of marketing, a newly created position established to support the company's continued growth and expand its investment in digital content, customer education, and brand development. Cordell brings a combination of audiovisual industry expertise and creative storytelling experience to the role. He spent more than 13 years in AV integration, advancing from field technician to vice president of technical operations at M3 Technology Group, where he led engineering, installation and technical support teams. Following the sale of his stake in the company in 2020, Cordell founded HiPhi Productions, producing films, television, and digital content that has generated more than 50 million social media views.

As VP of marketing, Cordell leads Visionary's marketing strategy, brand development, and digital content initiatives while expanding the company's educational resources for partners, integrators and end users. His production background will support the development of online training programs, technical education, product demonstrations and multimedia content designed to accelerate adoption of Visionary's growing portfolio, including the recently introduced nexAV We-Cosystem.

Company News

Compare, Explore, and Decide with cavlo Compares at Seattle Tech Expo

cavlo is introducing a new feature at this year's cavlo Seattle Tech Expo, giving attendees an entirely new way to experience audiovisual technology. Debuting October 21–22 at the Lynnwood Event Center, cavlo Compares is a hands-on product evaluation experience designed to help integrators, consultants, end users and technology professionals compare similar technologies in a neutral environment and determine which solutions best fit their own applications.

Developed in partnership with Coherent Design, cavlo Compares moves beyond traditional product demonstrations by allowing attendees to interact with multiple solutions within the same product category, all under the same conditions, so they can evaluate products based on their own priorities and project requirements.

Coherent Design will oversee the on-site evaluation process to ensure every participating manufacturer is presented fairly and consistently. Products will be displayed using standardized conditions, allowing attendees to compare features, performance, usability and functionality without influence.

LEA Professional Announces New Partnership with AVL Alliance

LEA Professional announced a new partnership with AVL Alliance, a Rocky Mountain region-based manufacturer’s representative. This partnership will bring LEA Professional’s extensive technology catalog to customers throughout Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, and parts of Texas.

AVL Alliance brings over 25 years of experience in live production and integration to the partnership. Through this partnership, AVL Alliance will represent LEA Professional’s Network Connect series of professional amplifiers and companion Dante Connect series featuring Dante and AES67 connectivity.

Learning environments have endured a seismic shift over the past five years, as classroom and instructional models were transformed first through necessity and subsequently through new behaviors and preferences born through change. AV technology has played a substantial role along the way, from bringing physical and remote learners together through UC platforms to enhancing collaboration through streamlined connectivity and control technologies.

AI-based technologies have increasingly played a role in this changing classroom technology landscape, with beamforming microphones and camera tracking technology among the first to make a difference in our evolving education environments. Today, they have become powerful tools to help expand access to spoken word content across languages and models in real time with on-demand subsequent access just as easy (and expected) for the learners to access.

We’ve all become accustomed to live tools on our phones that can caption the words of the person in front of us, including real-time translations, and even re-speaking those words in a language we best understand. These capabilities (and much more) are possible today to help learning become more accessible, efficient, and comprehensible.

Besides all the “magic” AI can bring to maximize learning and understanding, there are also regulations that have been increasing at federal, state, and local levels regarding accessibility. For example, “WCAG 2.1 Level AA” codifies the Department of Justice’s final rule on ADA Title II with respect to online content for public entities, including K-12 districts and public universities. So, in many situations, captioning is required, not just helpful.

Diversity Abounds

The community that makes up an education student body has evolved over the decades. Today, you’ll find students of all ages and from diverse backgrounds as international as any United Nations event. With that comes all manner of hearing abilities and languages—but that doesn’t mean any of those languages are what’s being spoken in the room.

Add to that the art of multitasking by many of today's students, where they slice their time in the classroom (if they’re in a room with others at all) across multiple activities and devices while lectures and classmate conversations unfold. Like me, some prefer to read transcripts rather than watch a video or listen to an audio recording; they may be a faster reader or their setting may just be more conducive to reading a transcript rather than experiencing a lecture in real time.

These are the dynamics that have propelled AI captioning or translation from advantageous to must-have. When evaluating these valuable solutions, buyers should consider aspects such as flexible pricing, ease of setup, accuracy, latency, allowance for custom word libraries, word filtering and substitution, automated indication of speaker change, automated punctuation insertion, a documented API for automation, file-based access to transcripts and sidecar files (used for adding captions to videos), and a live data feed to get captions and translation out to other platforms and systems. That’s quite a list, but they all matter when it comes to performance.

The better AI captioning systems add a grammar filter to know the right spelling (for example, “they’re,” “their,” or “there”), with latencies of three to four seconds for native captions. An additional second or two is acceptable for translations. The field of translation is evolving rapidly and getting better at managing word-order differences between languages.

Voice fingerprinting is also coming along fast. At first, in file-based material, a system could identify someone's voice in isolation so that the AI could ID the voice. It had time to process the file and provide their name along with their captioned words. Now, it’s possible to do this in real time with live captions as people speak, thanks to high-speed GPU processing.

One of the easiest ways to make spoken word content easier for folks in the classroom to absorb and retain is with a caption video display. Tech by companies such as ENCO makes this simple, with a local NUC-type PC running totally on-prem, using no internet, taking a local in-room mic feed, and displaying text captions on a video monitor of any size in real time.

Further, those captions can be sent to mobile sites or apps or other devices and recorded as text transcripts. After all, it's just data. Then, those transcripts can be married with video or audio recordings of the sessions later, making them highly searchable for students who want to go back and review targeted material again. All this can happen while allowing the instructors to upload custom word libraries, so the AI systems have a leg up on knowing about complex or uniquely spelled words and technical jargon.

This same technology is available today to support students who may not speak the native tongue. In some cases, you might need an Internet connection for live translations, but more companies are providing entire on-prem live translation capabilities as well. Users can even display both the in-room language captions and various other live transitions on the same screens or on other screens or devices in the room. (And don’t forget those multi-lingual transcripts.)

Keep in mind that many students also learn remotely. Today's technology can deliver these same live captions to where they learn, while still originating from the room where the little NUC computer resides. However, those captions and translations require relay through a public web server following standard datasec/cybersecurity policies. They can also be passed onto streaming encoders to feed streaming CDNs, a method traditionally closer to the proven CEA-608/708 closed captions that broadcasters use.

The Third Rail

Captions and transcripts are very much the “third rail” of content. When coupled with audio and video (live or recorded), they can be the gateway to identifying essential nuggets of information within hours of long recordings. Searchable transcripts can quickly return results—and with the right content management system, users can instantly link to the point in a recording where something specific was mentioned.

While smaller institutions might need an in-room, off-network portable caption cart for occasional captioning and translation needs, what if there are dozens of rooms that require captions? Not a problem—remember, it's all just data.

A central cluster of campus servers can feed classrooms around a connected campus, employing useful signal routing capabilities such as audio over IP to get in-room audio to the central servers. The same infrastructure can bring the caption text data back to the room to show on a video monitor via a tiny Raspberry Pi or similar small computer, with its web browser looking back to the proper server.

You can also bank transcripts from all the sessions, allowing students to access them later (based on user authentication controls, since not everyone has access to every class). An overall “conductor” application can oversee when sessions are routed to a caption engine where the captions and transcripts can be accessed.

The ability to caption speakers isn’t limited to the lecturer up front, of course, as ceiling-mount or other additional microphones can capture student questions and comments that inevitably take place. Some caption systems can even label the speakers, for example, as "lecturer" and "student."

When learning is paramount, the best educational environments make available the course material and dialogues in as many ways as the learner can absorb. AI tools are there to help make this highly affordable, flexible, and deployable across a variety of situations, buildings, technical environments, and other requirements.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Kelly Harlin, Director of Solutions Marketing and Commercialization at Sharp Imaging & Information Company of America

The cloud is fundamentally changing the AV landscape, shifting it from hardware-heavy setups to more flexible, software-driven platforms. As organizations adopt hybrid ways of working, AV has become essential to making collaboration feel seamless—whether people are in the office or working remotely. Cloud-based AV makes it easier to connect through video conferencing, shared content, and real-time collaboration tools, helping teams stay engaged and productive from anywhere.

One of the biggest advantages of cloud-based AV is how easily it scales. Organizations can roll out and manage AV across multiple locations without the need for large, upfront hardware investments. They can also adjust capacity as their needs change. With centralized, remote management, IT teams can monitor systems, push updates, and troubleshoot issues from anywhere, reducing downtime and lowering operational overhead.

We are also seeing that innovation drives faster adoption. Technologies like AV-over-IP and cloud-managed platforms are bringing AV and IT closer together, allowing systems to run on standard networks and integrate more easily with business applications. AI is adding another layer of intelligence, powering smarter cameras, better audio, and meeting spaces that can configure themselves. At the same time, open APIs are making it easier to build more connected, data-driven ecosystems.

As digital transformation continues to accelerate, cloud-based AV is evolving beyond a supporting tool into something much more strategic, helping organizations innovate, improve engagement, and better support how people work today.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Daniel Renne, Director of Emerging Technologies and Projects at Hall Technologies

Cloud-connected AV is rapidly shifting from a hardware-centric model to a data-centric ecosystem. Historically, the AV industry has lacked meaningful operational intelligence because most devices functioned as isolated endpoints with limited telemetry, analytics, or centralized visibility. As organizations continue adopting hybrid work, distributed campuses, and enterprise-wide collaboration standards, that model is no longer sustainable.

The next evolution of AV in the cloud is not simply remote management; it is intelligent data aggregation. Manufacturers and technology providers should be designing AV and IoT-enabled devices that securely capture operational, environmental, and usage data and route that information into centralized cloud platforms and data warehouses. Once data context exists at scale, organizations can apply AI and advanced analytics to uncover trends that were previously invisible.

The benefits are significant. End users gain deeper insight into room utilization, user behavior, technology adoption, and recurring integration issues. IT teams can proactively identify failures before they impact meetings—while also optimizing lifecycle planning, reducing downtime, and making more informed infrastructure investments. Cloud intelligence also creates opportunities for predictive maintenance, energy efficiency, and more personalized user experiences across enterprise environments.

However, organizations should approach cloud-connected AV strategically. Data governance, cybersecurity, and privacy must remain foundational considerations. Increased connectivity also introduces additional operational costs related to cloud infrastructure, storage, and ongoing device management. The industry must ensure that the value of data intelligence outweighs the complexity and cost associated with collecting and securing it.

Ultimately, AV in the cloud should not just connect devices; it should create actionable intelligence.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Jakub Kolacz, Manager of Product Management Software at Sennheiser

The shift to AV in the cloud reflects both a technological and operational evolution—one where systems are no longer treated as isolated room-based setups but as part of a broader, networked ecosystem. The defining trend is the move to centralized, cloud-based management platforms that provide continuous visibility into device health, configuration, and performance across multiple locations.

A key benefit of cloud platforms is the ability to remotely configure, monitor, and diagnose systems, allowing AV and IT teams to manage deployments proactively. For audio specifically, this means maintaining consistent performance by tracking device health, RF conditions, and firmware alignment from a unified interface. This is especially valuable in hybrid work scenarios, where the expectation is that every meeting delivers a reliable, high-quality experience regardless of location.

At the same time, centralized data unlocks deeper insights into usage patterns, fault trends, and environmental factors, informing better system design and ongoing optimization. Over time, this data foundation supports more advanced capabilities, including AI-driven monitoring and automated corrective actions, shifting teams toward oversight and governance rather than manual intervention.

That said, this transition comes with some important considerations. As AV systems become true network endpoints, they inherit IT-level requirements for security and compliance. Network stability is critical, and without it, the benefits of cloud management diminish. There is also a need for closer alignment between AV and IT teams, as shared ownership of systems can create complexities if responsibilities and workflows are not clearly defined.

Ultimately, cloud-based AV marks a shift from managing individual devices to managing system intelligence—but success depends on balancing innovation with infrastructure.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Lital Grossman, Executive Director for OpenAV Cloud

The cloud has transformed nearly every corner of enterprise technology. CRM, HR, finance, communications—all managed remotely, integrated seamlessly, and accessible from anywhere. It is now AV’s turn. But unlike those industries, AV is arriving at this moment carrying decades of proprietary infrastructure and siloed thinking.

The opportunity is significant. Cloud-connected AV means IT and facilities teams can monitor device health across hundreds of rooms from a single dashboard, respond to issues before they disrupt a meeting, automate workflows based on room status, and integrate AV systems with the scheduling, collaboration, and security platforms already running the enterprise. For end users, this translates to fewer disruptions, more reliable spaces, and technology that behaves like the rest of the IT stack—predictable, manageable, and scalable.

But the shift comes with real cautions. Not all cloud AV is created equal. Many vendors have moved infrastructure to the cloud while keeping their APIs closed, their data inaccessible, and their ecosystems locked. Organizations risk trading one form of dependency for another—swapping on-premise silos for cloud-based ones.

Security is another consideration that cannot be overstated. AV devices are increasingly IP-connected endpoints, and they need to be treated as such—with proper authentication, encrypted communication, role-based access, and documented protocols that IT and security teams can actually evaluate.

The path forward is openness. Cloud AV that exposes consistent, secure, read-write APIs gives organizations real choice—the ability to integrate best-of-breed solutions, build unified management layers, and avoid lock-in entirely.

The cloud moment for AV is here; the question is whether the industry will seize it openly, or simply rebuild the same walls in a new place.

AI capabilities in the AV industry are obviously accelerating rapidly—and with them comes a series of challenges. These include considerations around ethics and transparency about how AI is used, as well as training to ensure that teams across multiple parts of every business are using AI in a responsible way.

While the industry continues to navigate those challenges, it’s important to have some kind of formal accountability framework to keep everyone on the same page. Unfortunately, those frameworks have lagged behind the speed of development of AI tools.

That’s why we were really pleased to see the introduction of a new standard from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). ISO 42001 is the world’s first AI management system standard, and it provides valuable guidance for the fast moving world of AI deployment.

What is ISO 42001?

According to the ISO, the standard is designed to “set out a structured way to manage risks and opportunities associated with AI, balancing innovation with governance.” It specifies the requirements for an organization to establish, implement, maintain, and continually improve an Artificial Intelligence Management System (AIMS) within organizations.

ISO 42001 supports businesses as they consider what they need when rolling out AI. It covers whatever AI tools are being used, as well as how best to manage AI projects, including the assessment and mitigation of risks.

The ISO outlines its target users for 42001 as organizations "providing or utilizing AI-based products or services" and its objective as making sure those organizations have the guidance they need to use AI responsibly and effectively, even while the technology continues to evolve.

Consider all this, we felt it was important for Pleneo to follow the standards set out by ISO 42001, and were pleased to be the first device manufacturer in AV and unified communications to achieve the certification laid out by the standard. But why is it important that not just us but the wider industry adheres to standardization like this? And how does it actually keep companies, particularly tech companies, accountable?

Responsibility and Compliance

One of the biggest considerations for AI adoption is making sure that you’re using tools in line with regulations and in the most responsible way. There are a lot of ethical concerns over the data that’s used to train neural networks and models. If data is from an unverifiable source, there might be issues around ownership or biases being embedded into a final product or service. This unverifiable data is what stops people from trusting many AI products, as does the environmental impact of large AI applications.

The governance around how you use and manage data in your systems also ties into the correct use of AI. The ethical and responsible considerations aside, any organization using AI must be compliant with regulations and legal requirements. As the technology continues to be rolled out, there’s only going to be more regulations on the way.

The ISO 42001 framework, and its adoption of the PDCA—or Plan-Do-Check-Act—methodology ensure that companies are continually reviewing their use of AI data across their business to make sure they’re in line and compliant. For Pleneo in particular, the certification validates the approach we’ve taken to embedding AI technologies within our platforms. We’re not leaning on larger datasets available to public-facing AI tools but are instead processing intelligence locally.

It’s this data processing that the ISO 42001 standard addresses. We know that our use of AI reduces cloud dependency and preserves privacy. And with this standard, we’re able to demonstrate to our users a responsibility with our AI adoption, and that they can trust our AI tools in the same way as any other products in our lineup. Trust is going to be key for the entire industry as AI adoption continues.

Guidance and Opportunity

Businesses across all industries are appointing AI evangelists within their ranks. The AV industry is no different. Regardless of whether they’re new hires or people taking on the mantle within existing roles, many are working with AI for the first time. ISO 42001 provides those people, and organizations more widely, with practical guidance on how to deploy AI in many different ways, and how to mitigate AI-specific risks effectively when they arise.

Handling these sorts of issues more easily opens the door to innovation. Less time spent handling risks means more time taking advantage of the opportunities that AI presents across things like product and service development. That’s what is possible with the right framework in place thanks to the standards outlined by ISO 42001.

For the Pro AV sector, and for modern workspaces in particular, AI is influencing how meetings are prioritized, interpreted, and experienced. Oversight of the technology needs to extend beyond data protection to the integrity and predictability of automated decision making itself.

Formal governance standards like those from ISO will set mature platforms apart from experimental implementations. This is what ensures that intelligent meeting environments are viewed not as emerging technology, but as reliable, accountable enterprise systems.

Beyond singing along to Neil Sedaka in the car, my friend has never been musically inclined. And yet, now he's a published songwriter.

He sent me a link and there it was, a Christmas song. It wasn't him singing, but it was a fully composed song. He wrote the lyrics and a prompt, and an online AI service built his musical vision.

I gotta try this, I thought. Finally, a chance to repair my relationship with AI. Between bad headshots and warped action figures, my AI experiments over the past couple of years, while fun, would probably not land in the win column.

I've always wanted to record music, but I was impeded by my musical limitations. Writing lyrics isn't the problem, and I could carry a tune in a bucket in my younger days. But my drumming is elementary at best, my keyboard work is weak on a good day, and I'm guessing at least two guitar manufacturers would gladly pay me to admit publicly that I don't use their gear. So, to make my rock star dreams a reality, I'd need a band, some sort of recording studio, and a substantial budget to pay for all of that.

Scratch that plan. Enter AI.

First, I needed a song. I've had a song title floating around my subconscious for a while, so I sat down and wrote "Rockin' Chair" in about 20 minutes. If you study the lyrics, you can pick up the subtext of getting older and the loss of youth. But mostly it's an invitation to get busy on the front porch. (Hey, this is rock 'n' roll, not a sewing circle.)

Then, on a lazy Saturday, I went to the Suno website on my personal laptop. It took a few minutes to register, a few minutes more to write a prompt, and maybe two minutes to type in the lyrics. So, let's say I invested about 30 minutes in the process.

Suno spit out several versions of my song in less than a minute. And they were good.

Oh, the cadence was off, and none of them sounded exactly like how I "heard" the song in my head. However, every version had a good beat, background vocals, solid instrument work, and all the spit and polish you'd expect from a hit single.

I literally closed my browser and walked away. Didn't even look at it for more than a week. Honestly, I needed to process what had just happened. In seconds, AI had made my song a reality. I hadn't even plugged in my amp.

At this stage of my life, I have no illusions of becoming a musical sensation. If everything goes right, maybe I'll make tens of cents in royalties from "Rockin' Chair" over the next decade, which will not even cover the cost to use the service for a month. Oh, you can get a taste for free, but if you want to tweak your song and avoid copyright issues, you'll need to spend some money.

But that's not the point, is it? The point is a guy who can only play a few chords on a guitar could publish a toe-tapping tune in less time than it took to write the lyrics.

That said, this is AI, which means it has to learn how to do all this, no doubt using data (read: songs) produced by copyrighted artists. Remember, AI is not about soul, it's about statistical patterns. Essentially, my song is a kernel of creativity wrapped in a cocoon of predictive chunks and synthesized production.

So, is Suno a shortcut? You bet. Does that make it less of a song? I'm not sure. After all, we've been listening to songs built around music samples for decades. One could argue that AI is the next step in that sort of musical evolution. And I have it on good authority that Nashville music pros are using Suno to quickly produce demos (and save a lot of money in the process).

I'm not ready to equate machine learning to inspiration. But I'll say this: I think "Rockin' Chair" is a good song—and without AI, it would have never existed beyond my notepad. Rock on.

Technology leadership does not only mean asking an industry for better products or faster roadmaps. Sometimes it means looking back at the assumptions that have served us well, and asking whether they still serve the future we now need to build.

One of those assumptions in the AV industry is standardization.

For years, standardization has been one of the most important operating principles in enterprise AV and collaboration. It has helped organizations scale, reduce complexity, improve supportability, control cost, and create more consistent user experiences. Indeed, I spent more than a decade leading an organization that built its value proposition on the principle of Scale, Standardization, Simplification, & Speed.

We all know our industry's journey. There was a time when AV-enabled spaces were relatively few. Organizations invested only in the most important rooms. Bespoke design was possible because the volume was manageable.

Then the world changed.

Collaboration became more central to how organizations worked. Video became normal. Hybrid work expanded the pressure on meeting environments. Costs came down. Expectations went up. The challenge was no longer a handful of premium rooms. It was tens, hundreds, or thousands of spaces. In that reality, standardization was not only logical. It was a rational and required response to scale.

We have seen similar patterns in other industries. Local, highly human-scale models gave way to larger systems built around consistency, efficiency, and scale. Then, disruptive digital platforms introduced a third possibility: combining scale with greater personalization and relevance. We all know those stories, from Amazon to Netflix and beyond.

I believe that moment has arrived for our industry!

Change in an Era of AI

There will always be a place for highly customized spaces: executive environments, boardrooms, innovation labs, teaching studios, immersive rooms, command centres, and other spaces where deeper tailoring is justified. But for the broader enterprise estate, the old trade-off between scale and personalized fit is going to change in an AI era. Not because AI is a magic wand, but because it is relevant to addressing the very frictions that standardization was designed to manage.

We know that in the past, more capability meant more complexity. More flexibility meant more support burden. More customization meant more cost and inconsistency. That was not practical, which is why we simplified and standardized. Simplified room types, user interfaces, and feature sets. Exactly what was required to make the overall experience usable and manageable.

But there is a difference between simplifying because users have simple needs, and simplifying because our legacy systems and workflows could not manage complexity.

And that distinction matters.

Meeting and learning spaces were not simplified because users all wanted the same experience, but because more capability created too much friction to justify otherwise. So we designed interfaces to meet the lowest common user denominator. And in turn, we answered the needs of the supporting stakeholders as well, because the cost of variation was too high.

That made sense, but it also created a hidden effect. One of the hidden risks of standardization is that it does not only standardize solutions, it can standardize imagination. Over time, the constraints of a model become so familiar that we stop seeing them as constraints.

But what if some of those assumptions were actually just necessary coping mechanisms? Did we standardize because it represented the best possible experience, or because variation was too difficult to deliver, support, govern, or evolve?

That is not a criticism of the past, but a challenge for the future. It is not that we built the wrong rooms in the past. It is that in a new AI reality, the game itself has changed.

And that is what makes this new era so difficult.

Decisions in a Period of Unparalleled Uncertainty

End-user AV technology managers are being asked to make decisions in a period of unparalleled uncertainty, yet with traditional inertia. The investment decisions being asked of them today are expected to serve organizations for years ahead, yet they are being made in a reality where AI will change workflows, user expectations, interface models, support structures, and the role of the physical workplace itself in ways we cannot yet fully imagine.

That is a hard position to be in. It is easy to say “be more innovative, evolved, prepared” from the outside. It is much harder to put your name to decisions when the crystal ball is murkier than ever, and the consequences of getting it wrong may become visible sooner than ever.

So, the practical question is not whether every future capability is ready to deploy tomorrow. The better question is whether today’s standards, partner relationships, and decision criteria are preparing your organization to take advantage of that future potential or constraining it.

I do not believe the future is a pendulum swing from standardization back to customization. The better proposition is that the very definition of standards needs to evolve to create an entirely new paradigm.

Consider that historically, a room standard meant a fixed room type, equipment package, UI, capability set, and lifecycle expectation. A comprehensively defined answer built heavily upon the realities of traditional physical construction and real estate lifecycles.

In the next model, a standard may need to become more than just a defined answer. It may need to become more of a foundation.

The physical infrastructure, network requirements, security model, platform architecture, interoperability principles, and support processes may still need to be standardized. But above that foundation, the experience layer must become increasingly adaptive and digitally agile. One that can behave and equip users differently for a project review than for executive alignment. Differently for training than for ideation.

The room may be physically the same. The experience may not be.

That is the new possibility. The emergence of standardized infrastructure with adaptive experience.

That is how we can truly serve diverse users, activities, and outcomes, while leveraging that diversity as the very reason we convene people in the first place. All the reasons that were not possible in the past are eroding before our eyes.

Embrace that concept, and it frankly changes the role and importance of the end-user AV technology manager. The job is no longer simply to define the right room standards and defend them over a five-year lifecycle. Rather, the job is to build the conditions through which collaboration environments can evolve as capability, user expectation, organizational need, and AI-enabled possibility change around them. It is to recognize that we cannot deliver tomorrow’s adaptive collaboration expectations through models built around yesterday’s static propositions.

So the next leadership question is not simply “what can we standardize?”

It is “what should our standards enable?”

That is a very different question.

Manage and Mitigate Opportunities and Risks

Of course, I am not suggesting we all just embrace AI enthusiasm and unbridled optimism. But as in any time of change and lack of clarity, it means developing a strategy to manage and mitigate both the opportunities and risks ahead.

That strategy will, of course, not look the same for every organization. A global bank, university, healthcare provider, government agency, technology company, law firm, and manufacturer will each have different collaboration realities. But here are a few universal questions you might ask of your current standards to catalyze the mindset shifts we all need to embrace.

>> Which current standards still deliver value because they improve reliability, consistency, security, supportability, or user confidence?

>> Which exists because variation was historically too difficult to manage?

>> What infrastructure truly needs to remain fixed and physical, and what could become more flexible and digital?

>> Where might today’s standards, even unintentionally, limit tomorrow’s capability?

A “medium meeting room” is not a meeting purpose. A classroom is not automatically a learning experience. As we move from an era of equipping rooms to enabling outcomes, true leadership will be about understanding what people are actually trying to achieve in these spaces: deciding, creating, teaching, selling, learning, aligning, innovating, or responding to change. Understanding those patterns will become the critical capability in enabling spaces to adapt to real-time context and application.

Of course, that should change conversations with the supply chain: vendors, integrators, consultants, and service providers. They should not only be challenged on what they can deliver today, but on their vision of the future, and how they can help you prepare for it. In an AI era, the value of a partner may increasingly depend less on whether they can deliver an agreed standard today and more on how they can help that standard evolve tomorrow.

The risk of not making these sorts of foundational adjustments is not just technical debt, financial write-off, or user dissatisfaction. If collaboration is becoming the critical infrastructure of innovation, then the cost of rigidity becomes a constraint on organizational speed. A room standard anchored in yesterday's thinking that cannot evolve may slow more than a technology refresh. It may slow how quickly an organization can embrace the new ways of working of an AI age. And that should be a critical concern for every organization.

Across the industry, we need to embrace the fact that the game has changed. The constraint set is changing. The expectations of users, teams, and organizations are changing faster than traditional meeting room lifecycles were ever designed to absorb. So if that old model treated standards as fixed answers, the next model should treat them as adaptive foundations. The goal is not to choose between consistency and personalization. It is to create the conditions where consistency, governance, supportability, and scale can coexist with far greater human relevance, flexibility, and transformative future capability.

The industry can build products. Vendors can develop platforms. Integrators can deliver systems. Consultants can advise. But end users live in the real organizational context. They know the workflows, constraints, cultures, frustrations, security realities, support burdens, and business priorities that determine whether technology creates value and impact, or merely fills rooms.

So, whether you are an end-user Collaboration Enablement leader, or wherever else you might sit in the industry, I leave you to consider this.

Will the next “standard” you develop be anchored on a room type at all? Or might it be based upon the foundational principle of adaptability itself?

And if that is indeed the case, what might need to change in you, your team, and your organization to make that a reality?

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Steven Hoenig, Senior Director, Portfolio Expansion Program Management at Legrand | AV

The shift to cloud-managed AV isn’t just a technology upgrade; it’s a fundamental rethinking of how AV/IT teams operate. For institutions and organizations managing dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of spaces, the traditional break-fix model has a ceiling. Cloud platforms remove that ceiling.

The clearest benefit is visibility. Cloud-managed infrastructure lets you see early warning signs—unusual power draw, devices going offline, and patterns that precede failure—before anyone picks up the phone. That shift from reactive to proactive fundamentally changes what a small AV/IT team can manage effectively.

Scalability follows naturally. A team of three shouldn’t be limited to what three people can physically touch. Remote power management, automated monitoring, and developer-accessible APIs scale reach far beyond headcount. Automation handles the routine; staff focus on work that requires human judgment.

Energy management is underappreciated. Scheduled power-down routines for high-draw equipment during off-hours yield meaningful consumption reductions—relevant for any organization with sustainability commitments or operating cost pressures.

The cautions are worth noting. Network reliability becomes foundational; monitoring is only as good as your connectivity. Data security and access control require deliberate architecture, especially in sensitive environments. And cloud management without an operational framework generates a lot of data with no clear use for it.

The organizations getting the most out of AV in the cloud aren’t just using new tools; they’re redefining what their teams are capable of.

June came to a scorching hot close with Pro AV personnel announcements and partnership news, and that momentum has carried over to July. We had a Broadcast AV acquisition, while Adder, Ampetronic | Listen Technologies, Epiphan Video, and FOR-A made strategic appointments and hires, while Visionary, Chryon, and Owl Labs offer new trainings and services.

[The SCN July Issue Is Here: Dive Into an AI Future]

In acquisition news, Broadcast Solutions GmbH, a systems integrator and provider of innovative solutions for the broadcast media industry, is acquiring BFE Studio und Medien Systeme GmbH. This transaction is expanding its service portfolio to include in-depth expertise in the areas of studio and production technology, media IT, control center and control room systems, and customized hardware and software development.

As an independent company and an established brand with offices in Mainz and Vienna, BFE will become part of the Broadcast Solutions Group. The existing shareholders, Martin Dempf and Sven Hesselbach, will continue to jointly manage the company as managing directors. Peter Dinkel and Doris Hartl will continue to lead BFE in Vienna as managing directors. Customers and partners will not experience any changes to their points of contact, ongoing projects or services.

Now, make that cup of coffee, sit back, and get caught up on the week that was in your Monday dose of Pro AV Newsmakers.

Neil Hillier Appointed CEO to Lead Next Chapter at Adder

Adder Technology has appointed Neil Hillier as chief executive officer as part of a planned leadership transition and strengthened executive structure designed to support Adder’s continued growth, innovation, and global expansion. Additionally, Adder appointed: Paul Allen to chief financial officer; Jamie Adkin to VP of global sales; and Duncan Miller to VP global marketing and customer experience to bring together marketing, customer experience, and professional services and support.

Hillier succeeds Adrian Dickens, who transitions to the role of founder and executive chair following 42 years leading the business, with Nigel Dickens moving to Emeritus CTO. Hillier’s appointment aligns with the long-term stewardship principles established through the company’s recently announced Employee Ownership Trust.

Since joining the company in 2016, Hillier has played a key role in helping drive more than 70% revenue growth, building on the company’s global market position and helping shape its long-term strategy. With over two decades in the KVM industry, Hillier brings broad leadership experience spanning engineering, technology, operations and commercial management.

Ampetronic | Listen Technologies Strengthens Executive Leadership Team

Listen Technologies and Ampetronic have promoted Kevin Jewkes to SVP of global revenue and named Alan Kennedy VP of operations. Jewkes is responsible for Ampetronic | Listen Technologies’ overall sales strategy, sales operations, team leadership, and global go-to-market execution across North America and international markets. He strengthens and grows channel and partnership programs and works with the chief marketing officer and also collaborates with product management to ensure customer and market insights inform product strategy.

Kennedy is responsible for the strategy, performance, and scalability of the organization’s operational engine. He ensures that supply chain, manufacturing, logistics, quality, facilities, and IT operate as a unified system to reliably deliver products, support growth, and meet customer commitments. His background and experience are well-suited to translating company and product strategy into operational architecture that will enable the organization to scale efficiently.

Daktronics Sarah Rose Inducted to IDEA Hall of Fame

Sarah Rose, VP of global services at Daktronics will be honored by the Information Display & Entertainment Association (IDEA) at the 2026 IDEA Conference in Cincinnati, OH. Rose, along with John Adams of The Score, are two long-time fixtures in the sports industry who will be inducted into the IDEA Hall of Fame at a formal ceremony on July 15 during the conference.

Rose leads Daktronics’ global technical and professional services teams. She ensures they are fully equipped to deliver an outstanding customer experience by fostering a learning approach, both internally and externally. Previously, she managed the service teams for large sports venues, rental and staging, and international markets.

She has been a regular IDEA Conference attendee and influencer for more than 25 years. She represented a Daktronics team that received a total of 14 Allied Achievement GMAs and the President’s award in 1999. Her passion and activism for IDEA are always on display, serving on various committees, including Women and Inclusion & Outreach, which introduces high school and college students to careers in the industry.

Epiphan Video Appoints George Birchall as Chief Executive Officer

Epiphan Video has appointed George Birchall as chief executive officer. Birchall, formerly chief commercial officer, succeeds founder Mike Sandler, who will transition into the role of president.

Birchall has played a central role in expanding Epiphan's global commercial operations, deepening partner engagement, and driving the adoption of Epiphan solutions across multiple markets. As CEO, he leads the company's day-to-day operations, strategic growth initiatives, and ongoing investments in innovation.

FOR-A America Expands U.S. Sales Team

FOR-A America has added two regional sales leaders. Both Jaz Wray and Fernando Cruz come with a wealth of experience in SaaS platforms, AI-driven live production technology, and IP-based workflows. Cruz and Wray help advance customers’ vision and success with revived energy and excitement.

Wray’s sales and project management experience extends beyond media and entertainment to telecommunications, working with companies such as NEP, Ross Video, and Barco. Cruz led business development for the Corporate, Education, and Government segments of Sony Professional and Phantom/Vision Research, and most recently drove the global promotion and sales acceleration of SMPTE ST 2110 and IPMX solutions for Macnica Americas.

Company News

BirdDog's Entire Product Line Is Now NDI 6.3 Compatible

NDI announced that BirdDog has become the first hardware manufacturer to achieve full NDI 6.3 compatibility across its entire product lineup of cameras, encoders, and decoders. BirdDog hardware now natively supports NDI 6.3’s enhanced discoverability features. Those features include active Discovery Server registration through the new Sender Advertiser APIs, hostname-based device grouping, and real-time property broadcasting. This makes scalable IP video deployments far simpler, especially in segmented enterprise networks where that kind of simplicity has historically been difficult to achieve.

Before NDI 6.3, scaling across subnets was manual and complex. Discovery Server setup, IP tracking, and mDNS limitations made it difficult for sources and receivers to connect across VLANs. NDI 6.3 fixes that at the protocol level. Compatible BirdDog devices now auto-register with a central Discovery Server, route video via unicast, and send real-time status updates, significantly reducing deployment overhead.

Chyron Launches the All-New Chyron Academy:

The all-new Chyron Academy has officially launched, a ground-up redesign of the company’s product-training platform. Built on a fully custom, Chyron-branded learning experience, the new Academy replaces Chyron’s previous training system based on a third-party platform and launches with learning content covering the latest version of PRIME, Chyron’s flagship real-time broadcast graphics platform.

Chyron Academy is designed to serve two audiences at once: Customers and freelancers training on PRIME for the first time, and longtime Chyron users looking to become experts in the platform’s latest capabilities. Over the life of the previous legacy training program, more than 3,700 broadcast professionals registered to train on Chyron products, earning nearly 1,900 belt certifications across PRIME, PAINT, and Click Effects, including more than 60 Certified PRIME Black Belts worldwide. Chyron has transitioned that community to the new platform, migrating more than 950 current learners, along with the full certification history for every learner.

The redesigned Academy centers on a PRIME Belt certification path, taking learners through four levels—Yellow (Designer Basics), Green (Intermediate), Blue (Advanced), and Black (Expert)—with earned badges and completion dates appearing on each learner’s dashboard as a visual record of skill mastery. Every course module pairs a demo with a hands-on, full-screen simulation, so learners practice real PRIME workflows, such as building a lower-third graphic step by step, rather than passively watching video. An animated progress dial fills as learners complete demos, simulations, and quizzes, with a belt certification awarded automatically at 100% completion. Learners can enroll and move through the belt levels at their own pace. The program is suitable for individual learners, or supervisors or instructors can monitor the progress of their teams. The platform launches with five published PRIME courses spanning roughly 150 hands-on lessons, demos, simulations, and quizzes combined.

Owl Labs Launches Owl 360 Services

Owl Labs recently introduced Owl 360 Services, its first subscription service built to meet the needs of IT administrators. As organizations look to support hybrid work with deeper video enablement across more spaces, Owl 360 Services delivers three subscription tiers, offering dedicated support, centralized device management, proactive insights, and warranty coverage scaled to the size and complexity of the deployment.

The newly launched, highest-value Enterprise tier delivers a premium channel partner-only offering with advanced analytics, dedicated account management, and four-year warranty coverage, while the Enhanced tier will follow soon in Q3 with advanced analytics, dashboards, and API integrations. Every Owl Labs device is enrolled in the Core tier at no additional costs, giving all customers built-in analytics from the start. All three tiers provide unique insights, including talk-time insights, meeting duration tracking, visibility into the most frequently used devices and rooms, bulk deployment capabilities, reliable update management, and improved device tracking.

PlexusAV Appoints SINIUS PRO GmbH as New Distribution Partner

PlexusAV appointed SINIUS PRO GmbH as its distribution partner for Germany. The partnership will support PlexusAV’s continued growth in the German market, providing system integrators and AV professionals with access to its high-performance, open-architecture AV over IP solutions based on the IPMX standard.

The announcement follows a meeting at the EAV Group Solution Center in Heilbronn, Germany, bringing together the PlexusAV and SINIUS PRO teams. Through this partnership, SINIUS PRO will provide local market expertise, technical support and access to PlexusAV’s AV over IP solutions for system integrators and AV professionals across Germany.

Screen Innovations and Shade Innovations Unleash AI-Powered Support Agent

Screen Innovations (SI) and Shade Innovations have unveiled ATEN, an AI-powered support assistant built exclusively for its global network of dealers and installers. Named after the ancient Egyptian sun god whose light reached everyone, everywhere, ATEN was designed to provide instant access to SI expertise—anytime, from anywhere. Whether at a desk, on a jobsite, or atop a ladder on a late Sunday evening, dealers and installers can access accurate guidance and answers in seconds through text or voice.

Purpose-built for the custom integration industry, ATEN has been trained on SI's extensive library of product documentation, recorded support calls, installation guides, specifications, technical resources, and support knowledge. ATEN delivers immediate assistance across the company's entire portfolio, including motorized screens, window coverings, Black Diamond, SI Motor Technology, Zigbee and PoE protocols, the SI Ecosystem, drapery solutions, and more.

Visionary Level 1 Technical Training Approved for AVIXA CTS Renewal Units

Visionary Solutions' Level 1 Technical Training has been approved by AVIXA as a CTS Renewal Unit (RU) Provider course. The in-person training program is approved for 3.5 renewal units for CTS, CTS-D, CTS-I and Audiovisual Network Professional (ANP) certifications through May 31, 2028.

Visionary's Level 1 course provides an introduction to Visionary's AV over IP product portfolio and the foundational knowledge required to deploy audiovisual systems. Designed for system integrators, IT professionals, and technical support personnel new to Visionary products, the course covers network configuration, VLite installation and operation, encoder and decoder configuration, deployment best practices, third-party control integration, and system troubleshooting.

Participants gain an understanding of core AV over IP concepts, Visionary's product portfolio and system architecture, network considerations for reliable audiovisual distribution and best practices for system design and deployment. Course participants will learn how to deploy Visionary's solutions in bring-your-own-device (BYOD) environments and configure VLANs to separate video and audio traffic across different networks. The hands-on curriculum also covers endpoint configuration and management, troubleshooting techniques and operational workflows commonly encountered in professional AV environments.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: John Kruse, Senior Field Solutions Architect at ViewSonic

Cloud is no longer an emerging concept in Pro AV; it’s becoming the operational backbone for how systems are deployed, managed, and scaled.

For many organizations, the primary benefit is visibility. Cloud-based platforms provide centralized monitoring across rooms, buildings, and global campuses, allowing IT teams to proactively identify issues, push updates, and maintain consistent performance without being physically present. This shift is especially valuable as AV footprints expand and support resources remain constrained.

Scalability is another key advantage. New rooms and devices can be onboarded quickly, configurations can be standardized, and updates can be deployed broadly with minimal disruption. This reduces deployment friction and shortens the time between design and usability.

Cloud also enables better data-driven decisions. Usage analytics, system health metrics, and performance trends give organizations insight into how spaces are actually being used—informing future investments and helping justify budgets with real data. Platforms like ViewSonic’s myViewBoard Manager, for example, reflect this shift by enabling centralized, cloud-based device management and remote control across distributed display environments.

However, moving AV into the cloud is not without considerations. Security and compliance must be addressed up front. AV devices are now part of the broader IT ecosystem, requiring alignment with network policies, authentication standards, and data governance practices. Organizations in regulated industries may face additional scrutiny around where data is stored and how it is transmitted.

There is also a dependency on network reliability. Cloud-managed systems assume consistent connectivity, and outages—whether local or upstream—can impact control, monitoring, or functionality.

Ultimately, cloud in AV is less about convenience and more about operational maturity. Organizations that approach it strategically—balancing scalability with security—will be better positioned to manage growing AV ecosystems with confidence.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Petro Shimonishi, Director of New Business Development at Panasonic Projector & Display Americas

The AV industry is undergoing a meaningful transformation, shifting from isolated, hardware-centric systems to open, cloud-connected ecosystems. This evolution is less about moving AV to the cloud and more about extending its capabilities through connectivity, interoperability, and intelligent management.

A defining trend is the move toward open, platform-agnostic systems. As organizations deploy increasingly complex technology stacks, seamless communication across devices is now essential. Historically, proprietary protocols made multi-vendor deployments difficult to manage, which is why industry collaboration is critical. Efforts like the OpenAV Cloud Association are helping drive standardization across device telemetry, cloud-to-cloud communication, security models, and open APIs.

At Panasonic Projector & Display Americas, we’ve embraced this shift as a founding member of the OpenAV Cloud Association and by introducing web-based APIs across our projector and display portfolio. These APIs enable third-party integration and allow external applications to monitor and control devices over IP networks. Through our partnership with XYTE, users gain real-time visibility and remote management.

The benefits of cloud-connected ecosystems are clear: improved system visibility, faster troubleshooting, reduced downtime, and more scalable deployments.

However, there are important considerations. Security and data protection remain top priorities, as connected devices introduce new potential attack surfaces. This is why cloud solutions must incorporate secure communication protocols and rigorous standards such as SOC2 compliance—supported by Panasonic’s ongoing firmware updates and XYTE’s secure cloud infrastructure. Reliability is another concern. That’s why it’s important that Panasonic solutions continue to operate locally, even if the network goes down. Meanwhile, avoiding proprietary lock-in provides long-term flexibility, while clear data policies and total cost visibility support smarter long-term decisions.

Ultimately, cloud-enabled AV should help organizations work smarter and respond faster while staying secure and flexible.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Toine Leerentveld, Director of Product Management, Cloud and Control Services at Crestron

Most conversations about AV in the cloud still focus on what moves where. The more useful question is, what changes about the relationship between vendor, integrator, and customer once the control layer becomes software?

Start with deployment: Cloud-managed AV should reduce the number of people who need to be in the room, literally and figuratively. Crestron built the XiO Cloud platform around that idea, letting one technician provision and monitor a global room footprint from a single dashboard, and turning most truck rolls into remote sessions. The measure of success is not the dashboard itself, but how much faster a new site comes online compared to five years ago.

The control layer is where the bigger shift happens. Crestron Virtual Control (VC-4) can run in a customer's private cloud or existing virtualized environment, scaling from a single room license to enterprise deployments at the customer's pace rather than the vendor's. Growth and upgrades stop being hardware events. That changes the procurement cycle, the refresh cycle, and, eventually, the org chart on the customer side.

Security gets glossed over in this conversation more than it should. Microphones, cameras, and room sensors tied to cloud services create a different threat model than legacy AV. Crestron treats security as a development discipline, with encrypted communications, role-based access, and a real vulnerability response program. The vendors who do the same will pull away from the ones who treat it as a press release.

The last shift is feedback velocity. Software updates ship in weeks, whereas hardware revisions took years, which means a customer request can become a feature inside the same budget cycle. The vendors who actually use that speed will define the next decade of this category.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Adam Sowers, Senior Manager, Business Development at Sony Electronics

Like most areas of modern business and everyday life, AV has shifted to the cloud. As organizations move away from on-prem hardware, AV-as-a-Service (AVaaS) has become a practical, forward-looking model—one that delivers value today while remaining flexible for what’s next.

The benefits are clear. Cloud-based AV improves efficiency, accessibility, and consistency while centralizing visibility and control. Teams gain real-time insight into device health and usage, issues can be identified before they become outages, and the need for on-site maintenance is reduced. Additionally, collaboration becomes more reliable and repeatable across locations.

At the platform level, different solutions serve different roles. Sony’s Device Management Platform (DMP) is purpose-built to manage Sony’s displays, offering device-specific monitoring, control, analytics, and software management that are tightly aligned with Sony hardware. In parallel, Xyte provides an open, hardware-agnostic cloud platform designed to manage devices from multiple manufacturers through a single pane of glass. That openness is especially valuable for organizations and integrators supporting mixed AV environments.

Together, these cloud platforms integrate with content providers to enable seamless digital signage, while cloud collaboration tools support consistent meeting experiences that promote meeting equity. Subscription-based models further simplify budgeting and improve cost predictability.

As with any cloud strategy, success starts with a reliable network, well-defined security and compliance requirements, and alignment with vendors that prioritize interoperability over lock-in.

This is why Sony, Xyte, and other AV manufacturers and technology providers support OpenAV Cloud—an industry initiative focused on driving collaboration, standards, and interoperability for the long-term benefit of integrators and end users.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Joe Andrulis, Executive Vice President of Corporate Development at Biamp

The audiovisual industry has reached a pivotal moment. Comprehensive, cloud-based software solutions now deliver what organizations have long sought: a unified platform for managing AV environments throughout their complete lifecycle from anywhere in the world. From initial design concepts through deployment, real-time monitoring, continuous optimization, and daily use, modern cloud-based management platforms provide AV and IT teams with integrated tools at every critical stage. This end-to-end approach reinforces organizations' commitment to connecting people through extraordinary audiovisual experiences across their global operations.

These maturing, cloud-based desktop applications, such as Biamp Workplace, are transforming how AV installers work on-site and remotely, relieving common pressures during installation and commissioning. Built-in intelligent tools enable automated device discovery, streamlined firmware management, and intuitive device configuration. Perhaps most revolutionary is that AI agents are now assisting technicians in configuring devices properly, dramatically reducing setup time and eliminating guesswork during large-scale deployments.

What makes these AV management solutions truly versatile is operational flexibility. Whether teams work fully on premises, remotely, or in hybrid scenarios, the same powerful capabilities remain accessible. Platforms that can support offline or hybrid workflows can also help maintain continuity and momentum regardless of network conditions, supporting productive, consistent workflows. This adaptability means faster commissioning cycles and greater confidence in deployment outcomes, especially for environments that must continue to operate regardless of network conditions.

Ultimately, the holy grail of AV management is within reach: providing organizations with unprecedented control over their entire AV infrastructure at every stage. Whether operating in the cloud, on-premise, or through hybrid architectures, today's comprehensive platforms enable seamless oversight from initial design and deployment through ongoing optimization and support to product end of life—delivering the visibility, efficiency, and reliability that modern audiovisual environments demand.

AVT Question: Please share insights and trends on AV/IT in the cloud, including the benefits and cautions.

Thought Leader: Mohammad Al-Taraireh, Director of Product Management at Shure

As enterprises standardize collaboration spaces across campuses, regions, and hybrid work environments, AV is no longer a one-time room build; it’s becoming a managed service. The shift to cloud-connected AV reflects a broader reality: IT teams are being asked to deliver consistent experiences at scale while keeping systems secure, supportable, and measurable over time.

The biggest benefit of cloud-based AV is not only remote access, but, most importantly, operational control. When devices are connected through a cloud management layer, organizations gain centralized visibility into what’s deployed, what’s healthy, and what needs attention. That makes it possible to apply a fleet mindset: consistent configurations across room types, faster rollout of standardized templates, and proactive monitoring that identifies issues before they disrupt meetings. In practical terms, cloud management reduces truck rolls; shortens time-to-resolution; and helps maintain a predictable user experience, whether a space is a huddle room or a large, divisible conference room.

Interoperability remains essential, especially as Microsoft Teams and Zoom become the standard interface for daily work. Cloud-connected AV can support repeatable designs that align audio performance to certified room environments, helping reduce inconsistency and rework across varied spaces.

However, cloud connectivity raises important precautions. Organizations should evaluate security and governance first, including role-based administration; authentication alignment with IT identity practices; and clear policies for device onboarding, updates, and access control. Network readiness also matters. Segmenting AV endpoints, confirming bandwidth and quality-of-service, and planning for lifecycle management are key to ensuring reliability.

Ultimately, cloud-based AV enables scale without sacrificing control and turns room technology into an enterprise system that can be monitored, governed, and continuously improved.

Artificial intelligence has taken over Pro AV. At least, it feels that way. New products tout “AI this” or “AI that.” Some folks brag how AI is simplifying their inbox or streamlining their reports, while others fear for their jobs. Every professional conversation somehow seems to wind its way back to AI.

Once we get past summaries that reduce hourlong meetings into bullet points and Instagram videos that trample on intellectual properties for comedic effect, what does it all mean? From machine learning to large language models (LLMs), how is AI truly impacting the Pro AV industry today, and what can we expect in the coming years?

To find the answers, SCN reached out to industry futurists and technologists to collect their thoughts on the current state of AI in Pro AV—and explore potential roadmaps into our industry's next chapters.

Accentuate the Positive

Julian Phillips, SVP and managing director of XTG, the AVI-SPL Experience Technology Group, has spoken extensively about AI and last year released LevAIthan: A Brief History of Humanity and AI, a book co-authored with Athena, his AI assistant. In his book, he argued that we should stop calling it “artificial intelligence” and start calling it “augmented intelligence.” His point is that AI’s greatest value is in strengthening people, not replacing them.

“If we call it artificial intelligence, we think substitution. If we call it augmented intelligence, we think amplification,” he explained. “The wording matters because language shapes strategy. The best AI does not remove the human being from the experience; it makes the human more capable within it.”

According to Phillips, AI is most powerful when it helps designers, technicians, support teams, and end users work faster, smarter, and with greater confidence. “At AVI-SPL, for example, Symphony helps organizations monitor and manage assets across the network, identify issues earlier, and support users more proactively,” Phillips said. “That is a practical example of intelligence improving both operational performance and the user experience.”

In his role at Midwich, Chris Neto, head of emerging markets, revealed that AI is changing the conversation both internally at and with external vendor partners. “'Emerging markets' used to mean geography. Now it also means capability,” he said. “AI is accelerating that shift. Markets and verticals that may have lagged in the traditional sense now have the opportunity to leapfrog through software-driven, AI-enabled solutions.”

And that’s where Neto’s role is evolving. “It’s no longer just about identifying where growth might happen,” he said, “it’s about helping our teams within Midwich understand what’s possible and then extending that insight to our vendors and manufacturer partners so we can move together, faster and more strategically. AI doesn’t replace strategy, but it absolutely sharpens it.”

Of course, the willingness to integrate AI with AV systems depends entirely on the client, said Rich Green, president and CEO of Rich Green Design. "We’re still very early in the AI journey," he said, "so what my clients demand is superb audio, superb video, and flawless connectivity. Our job as integrators is to help them understand how AI fits into their broader digital transformation strategy. If AI can improve speech intelligibility or automate presentation connectivity, hooray! If it gets in the way, VC partners get ornery."

Perceptions and Realities

So, is AI being perceived in Pro AV as a godsend or a job killer? If you ask Neto, it's following a very familiar pattern.

“Every major shift, from DSP to networked AV to the cloud, came with the same fear cycle,” he said. “AI is just the latest iteration. The difference now is the speed and accessibility. The people who see it as a job killer are usually thinking about tasks. The people who see it as a tool are thinking about outcomes.”

"The Pro AV industry has always relied heavily on automated workflows, and AI represents a new era for efficiency," added David Labuskes, CEO of AVIXA. "Adopting AI requires thoughtful consideration of how it fits into current systems and processes. In some cases, it may accelerate tasks or simplify programming, but the fundamentals remain the same: Professionals are still defining the goals, guiding the system, and validating the outcomes."

AVIXA maintained a pragmatic view of AI in its education program at InfoComm 2026. "AVIXA is focused on what’s actually happening with AI today," Labuskes said. "We’ve moved past the phases of 'AI will do everything' and 'AI isn’t doing most of those things.' Instead, we’re now in a phase where practical applications are emerging and adoption is steadily growing. Rather than focusing on fears of widespread job loss, the emphasis is on how people are actually using AI in their day-to-day roles to work more efficiently and effectively."

Phillips warned that AI literacy is vital in today's Pro AV workplace, because AI is entering the workplace—whether people are ready for it or not. "In modern Pro AV, understanding AI is becoming as important as understanding signal flow," he said. "AI literacy matters because it helps people separate real capability from hype. It helps them ask better questions, apply the tools responsibly, and have more credible conversations with customers who are already looking at how AI fits into their workplace strategies. This is not about keeping up, it's about staying ahead."

Joe Andrulis, EVP of corporate development for Biamp, expects AI will empower productivity gains, because it eliminates training barriers and helps workers come up to speed more rapidly. "With AI, products get easier to implement because the products themselves incorporate artificial intelligence to make setup more dependable and to handle situations dynamically," he explained. "However, I don’t know the net effect, positive or negative. I think the effect of AI will be varied by sector and by application area. Some jobs are going to be greatly enhanced, and AI will be a big boost to AV, while others might be negatively impacted."

For example, Andrulis acknowledged that one of the big challenges in the dealer community has been finding qualified people. "The more that AV systems can incorporate intelligence natively, the more easily integrators can install systems with less specialized workers, which can make it easier to hire while also ensuring a more standardized outcome across geographies," he said. "In the past, customers were often willing to pay for high-value installation services, but that was very difficult for dealers to scale as the pool of qualified experts is very limited. With AI, they are giving up some of that high-value work, but in return they get scale. Scale is how dealers can win with AI."

Aim Higher

"On the design and pre-construction side, AI tools are meaningfully accelerating how integrators work," Green observed. "AI can help parse complex RFPs, draft system narratives, cross-reference equipment specifications, and even generate first-pass signal flow documentation. Work that used to take days can now take an hour. That's not a small thing because it frees up real time for the higher-value, higher-judgment work that actually requires a human expert."

That expertise is an indispensable part of equation. "We dare not underestimate the human in the loop," Green warned. "Nurturing talented and competent professional humans is the most important path to sustained success and prosperity. The liability and the craft are still ours to own."

AV has always been built on relationships, trust, and experience, which Neto said AI can’t replace. Instead, AI removes friction. “It handles the repeatable, the predictable, and the scalable, which frees us up to focus on what actually matters: creativity, customer experience, and quality service,” he said. “So no, it’s not killing jobs, but it is going to expose complacency.”

Based on discussions with clients and other integrators, Dave Van Hoy, president of Advanced Systems Group, said defining what AI is for Pro AV really depends on who you ask. “AI is a buzzword. AI is an initiative. AI is an actual functional tool. We're at the evolution of these tools, where all these things are true,” he offered. “It’s in many applications. It's a management initiative with no clear definition. It's being used today in everything from camera tracking to closed captioning, graphics generation, and many other things."

AVIXA research shows a shift toward practical adoption. According to Labuskes, studies of AI use in the Pro AV workplace show significant growth in implementation, along with increased recognition of its benefits, particularly since the rise of GenAI. "While AI continues to evolve, it is clearly becoming more deeply embedded within organizations," he said, "and as adoption matures, its business impact will be increasingly measurable."

But Phillips believes too many organizations are treating AI as a productivity hack, rather than as a "partner in exploration" that can help teams model possibilities, test ideas faster, identify patterns, and solve problems. "If we're implementing AI just to make us faster," he argued, "we're aiming too low."

Present Practicalities

In the real world, AI features have gone from nice-to-have to expected faster than most people realize. “Walk into any modern meeting space, and AI is already there—whether people call it that or not,” Neto offered. “Auto-framing, speaker tracking, noise cancellation, transcription, translation. These aren’t futuristic features anymore, they’re baseline expectations.”

However, when it comes to AI and UCC, Neto thinks the industry needs a reality check. “AI is only as good as the environment it’s operating in,” he explained. “We can’t talk about AI-driven transcription and translation, arguably two of the most in-demand features from end users, without talking about acoustics. If the room sounds bad, the AI performs badly. It’s that simple.”

Shure is already integrating AI into its products to provide intelligent noise suppression and voice focus. "AI is only as effective as the data it ingests," agreed Christine Schyvinck, president and CEO of Shure, "so pristine audio is paramount for AI to do its job and for end users to experience greater productivity."

In other words, speech intelligibility should now be considered foundational for meeting spaces. Poor acoustics lead to poor data, which leads to poor outcomes.

“So, while AI is raising the bar for what these systems can do, it’s also raising the bar for how we design spaces,” Neto advised. “Integrators and designers need to think beyond the camera and the codec and start with the room itself. Because at the end of the day, if the AI can’t clearly understand what’s being said, everything else falls apart.”

Improving Products

Schyvinck believes AI can be a game changer when it comes to product development—with the right governance, policies, and planning. At her company, AI is not only assisting with the process, it's making product development more effective and efficient.

"AI has definitely helped accelerate many tasks, which can help us bring products to market faster," Schyvinck noted. "It is especially well suited for rapid prototyping. AI assists with learning and acquiring user feedback earlier in the development process, which is something we value a great deal at Shure because of our focus on customer input."

Schyvinck said Shure has been leveraging AI in its products for years, and it serves a critical role in today's UCC products. " AI helps with hybrid work pain points," she explained. "It enhances meeting intelligence, workflow automation, personalization, and analytics."

AI is certainly improving Biamp products—for example, cameras include auto zoom and focus as well as tilting capabilities, while AI noise reduction is helping to improve voice intelligibility in ways that users may not even realize. "Thinking broadly, AI is enabling products to become easier to use while also becoming more flexible," Andrulis said. "AI software, such as Biamp Launch, is now embedded into system programming, including auto setup and auto tuning.

"This is useful beyond just installation, as it can adapt to changes in the environment. As a result, the end user is getting a much more polished experience in a wider set of use cases," Andrulis added. "It’s all happening more efficiently and at lower cost, with overall better performance and without any overt action from individuals."

Predictions and Next Steps

AI has already made some pretty impressive technological strides. As Labuskes said, "While our eyes are on how AI is being used in practical AV applications, we're also tracking its potential to make huge shifts across the industry."

Coming soon, look for continued growth in Edge AI, which is the practice of running AI locally on AV devices instead of sending it to the cloud. And beyond that is Physical AI, which combines sensors and control systems with AI to create meeting rooms that essentially run themselves.

Van Hoy said the best is yet to come. "Today, AI can take care of many mundane tasks," he said. "As we go forward, it will be able to do more sophisticated things, including technical direct productions and allow voice control of AV systems for unattended use. The applications will continue to evolve, particularly in the routine applications where humans provide the least creative value."

Schyvinck has already seen the shift from static hardware to adaptive learning systems. "End users want meetings that automatically generate, track, and facilitate action items and tasks," she explained. "They want rooms that self-diagnose issues and trigger support workflows or even self-heal."

Green agreed that platforms that can flag anomalies in system behavior before a client even notices a problem are a "genuine operational win" for integrators and end users. "AI-enhanced knowledge management systems for system integrators and support technicians will be a game changer," he predicted.

Voice control in professional environments needs attention, Green said, mostly because consumer voice AI tech can't be used due to cybersecurity and privacy concerns. However, he expects agentic AI, which makes its own decisions and takes action, to have a significant impact on system interoperability. "It’s a wild frontier fraught with hazards but improving exponentially," he added. "That’s the space to watch right now."

A Word of Warning

For Neto, the future of AI in Pro AV is about better overall experiences, not features. The industry is heading toward environments that are context-aware spaces that "understand who’s in the room, what they’re trying to do, and adjust in real time without manual intervention."

However, that kind of AI integration should probably come with a warning sticker. "Just because we can automate everything doesn’t mean we should," Neto said. "There’s a balance between intelligent and intrusive. The winners won’t be the ones who cram in the most AI; they’ll be the ones who use it with purpose thoughtfully, transparently, and in ways that actually make human interaction better, not more complicated."

For Green, the IT manager is often the integrator's point of contact, and they are "extremely cautious" about introducing AI. "Cybersecurity is top of mind in these firms. AI poses new threats, often cleverly disguised," he explained. "It’s best to defer to predictable reliability and hold off on AI tricks in these environments. Sophisticated clients can see right through them."

While AI-driven diagnostics and remote monitoring are maturing, Green said the interoperability and standardization layer still needs improvement. "Integrated systems can be sourced from a dozen different manufacturers, and the AI features often live in proprietary ecosystems that don't talk to each other elegantly," he noted. "The industry needs either stronger open standards or deeper partnerships at the platform level before AI can reach its full potential in a fully integrated system."

Andrulis had his own warning—about unintended consequences. "As the systems become smarter, we need to recognize that our industry is about audio and video sensors," he said, "and as they become more widely used and data is processed more intelligently, there are valid concerns about surveillance or the misuse of personal information. Users may not even be aware it’s happening.

"The good news is that as we get more information, we can do even more wonderful things with that information, but that is assuming good intentions," he continued. "Bad actors can use that information in ways that do not benefit end users. There is a potential dark side to this paradigm and as an industry we need to be cognizant of that."

In live production, switching happens in the moment. In sports, for example, no one knows what’s coming next—and if the operator misses the shot, it’s gone. Even in news, where rundowns provide structure, switching still has to react dynamically to what’s happening on air.

The pressure hasn’t gone away. But the systems behind it have evolved.

In my previous column, I said that FPGA changed the trajectory of production tools by letting engineers evolve a switcher instead of rebuilding it. Functions that once required fixed hardware can now be designed in software and loaded onto programmable silicon. If something needs fixing, it can be reprogrammed. If requirements change, it can often be reworked, provided the FPGA has been sized correctly.

A production switcher can be built to meet today's requirements. When a customer asks whether the system could also do something it wasn’t originally designed to do, the question becomes whether that capability can be added within the existing architecture.

Cloud With Constraints

Across the industry, business models are under pressure. More content is being delivered over the internet and OTT platforms. Long-established broadcasters are rethinking how they operate. Sports organizations stream directly to audiences, corporate teams run significant production infrastructure, and independent producers put content online every day. The production landscape has grown, and with it, the infrastructure decisions.

Five years or so ago, the industry buzzed about moving everything to the cloud. With income and turnover reducing, many organizations needed to find ways to cut both operating costs and CapEx budgets—and the cloud seemed like the answer. Providers like AWS and Azure offer massive amounts of compute power, so the whole industry began working on virtualizing what we've typically done in hardware and FPGAs.

Some parts of media production made that shift easily. Media playout, for example, has always suited the cloud, Netflix being the obvious example.

But live production is different. The challenge isn't insurmountable, but it's technically complex. Getting multiple feeds into the cloud, producing there, and getting the output back requires compromises, including a lot more compression. Still, if it can save money, people want to make it work.

More recently, early enthusiasm about the cloud has given way to a shift in thinking. Without major advances in technology, putting everything in the cloud remains, for live production at least, something closer to a utopian dream than a practical reality, except at relatively small scales.

Bursting into the Cloud

In live production, systems have always been built for the biggest day—the worst-case size and production need. That means a lot of capacity sits idle most of the time. Every studio in the world is overbuilt on purpose, sized for the maximum need, even though that maximum might only happen a few times a year.

Bursting offers a different approach. Rather than investing in permanent infrastructure to handle rare peaks, the cloud can supplement an existing system when demand briefly exceeds the base setup.

Elections are a good example. A broadcaster may suddenly need additional camera feeds for a few hours or a few days, more than the on-prem system can support. In those cases, extra capability can be added temporarily by bursting into the cloud.

Used this way, the cloud doesn’t replace on-prem systems; it complements them. For many use cases, putting everything in the cloud can end up costing more than running systems on-prem. As a supplement, however, there can be enough affordable horsepower to make it worthwhile.

That’s why the conversation has shifted. It’s no longer about on-prem or cloud, but how to combine the two in a way that fits organizations, workflows, and business models. The hybrid approach will be the real game changer. And as it matures, so will the tools and services that support it.

For most, the future looks hybrid.

The post-InfoComm hangover is real, so it was a bit quieter this past week in Pro AV headlines. That is not to say there wasn't news you needed to know.

[Apogee Insights, SCN Partner for SCN Top AV Consultants 2026]

While M&W Pro Audio was founded in 2022 by Greg Mackie and British audio/digital engineer Peter Watts, M&W Pro Audio made its industry debut at InfoComm, introducing itself on the global stage to the Pro AV and pro audio world. There, it demonstrated the new D24 and D32 digital mixers. Engineered for modern live production environments such as houses of worship, theaters, concerts, corporate AV, and nightclubs, the D24 and D32 digital mixers deliver enhanced sound quality, intuitive touch-screen-based operation, versatile signal management, and robust performance in a compact form factor.

Mackie and Watts have a symmetry of talents that spans decades developing of a host of products. Watts brings decades of pro audio engineering experience and a shared vision for the next evolution of digital mixing technology. Together, the M&W Pro Audio team has spent five years developing and refining a new generation of fully digital mixing systems built around advanced DSP architecture, advanced microphone preamps and high resolution touch interfaces, delivering dramatically expanded functionality, faster operation, intuitive workflow, and a platform designed to support continuous feature growth and software evolution throughout the life of the product.

"I've never stopped gathering ideas about how to make live mixing easier," Mackie reflected on his new company. "The D24 and D32 are the culmination of decades of sound experience and four solid years of translating my ideas into a more intuitive, easier workflow. My goal was to create a touch screen mixer “done right”. We believe we have accomplished this, but it took years of design, review, redesign, and final design."

What else happened this week? Keep reading to find out.

1 SOUND Custom Shop Launches Exterior Wood Finishes

1 SOUND’s Custom Shop is now offering outdoor wood finishes for all of its loudspeakers. 1 SOUND is utilizing research and inspiration from ancient techniques of structural building from places like Japan and Norway, which have proven to stand the test of time.

1 SOUND discovered how to offer its premium, commercial loudspeakers in wood finishes that work with the elements of nature for loudspeaker durability and longevity in permanent installation outdoors. All 1 SOUND loudspeakers are customizable for indoor and outdoor applications in only 3-4 weeks' time.

Absen Unveils Upgraded Global Booking Platform

Absen announced a full upgrade to its global showroom booking system, making it easier for customers and partners to schedule visits to the company’s growing international network of showrooms. The platform was designed to deliver an intuitive and user-friendly experience.

Over the past year, Absen has continued to expand its global showroom footprint, opening new sites and brand factory stores across the Americas, EMEA and APAC. Newly added locations include Los Angeles, Mexico, and Denver in the Americas; Morocco and Saudi Arabia in EMEA, as well as Korea and Vietnam in APAC. Each showroom is designed to reflect local market needs with carefully curated displays that demonstrate how Absen’s innovative LED solutions can be applied across a range of sectors and markets.

The newly upgraded booking interface has been created to simplify every stage of the visitor journey including choosing a location and arranging an appointment. With a cleaner design and more seamless navigation, the platform enables users to identify their nearest showroom, select a suitable time and submit visit requests with greater ease and confidence. The result is a smoother digital experience that complements Absen’s on-the-ground investment in local service and customer engagement.

Introducing AVPro Design Services

AVPro Global announced the formation of AVPro Design Services (ADS), a dedicated team of AVPro system architects that helps integrators design, program, and deploy professional AV systems with precision and efficiency. The ADS team will support integrators serving market segments such as business and corporate, education, government, hospitality and retail, houses of worship, and medical. The new support services group represents AVPro’s continued evolution as a leading manufacturer of audio, video, and control solutions for professional integrators.

The ADS team will support the deployment and configuration of AVPro's comprehensive product portfolio, including AVPro Edge, AudioControl Pro, RTI, Bullet Train, Murideo, and ThenAudio brands, by designing systems that are inherently stable, scalable, and perfectly tailored to the client.

Iris Unveils New Angekis and Bolin Integrations

Iris announced OEM partnerships with Angekis and Bolin at InfoComm 2026. These partnerships will bring native Iris technology directly into the firmware of select PTZ camera models from the two brands.

With a simple free upgrade to the latest firmware on the Angekis Saber X and Bolin B2 camera lines, customers can instantly link their now Iris-enabled cameras to the Iris platform. This unlocks a suite of features accessible through a single browser or app window with no additional hardware required.

Through Iris, users can remotely manage cameras with low-latency control, collaborate across teams and locations, and leverage AI-powered tools for framing, preset creation and recall, and more. This is all done without the complexity of traditional hardware-based systems. These new partnerships strengthen Iris's growing ecosystem of camera manufacturers and reinforce its commitment to interoperability. The Iris platform supports more than 400 camera models and integrates with leading switchers, IP controllers, and production software, allowing organizations to modernize operations while preserving existing infrastructure investments. In addition, Angekis and Bolin now join eight other brands that have Iris-enabled devices, allowing those cameras to connect to the Iris platform directly without needing a network bridge device.

MultiDyne Video & Fiber Optic Systems is acquiring the assets of MRMC (Mark Roberts Motion Control), a developer of robotic camera systems, motion control solutions, and automated camera tracking technologies for broadcast, digital cinema, sports production, and live events. As part of the transaction, MultiDyne has established MultiDyne Robotics and Motion Control, a new company that will maintain the MRMC brand. The acquisition brings MRMC’s core technologies, intellectual property, manufacturing capabilities, and key engineering expertise into the MultiDyne organization, creating a powerful combination of complementary technologies that extend MultiDyne’s reach to the very beginning of the content creation chain.

[The Experience Economy, Revisited]

"MRMC is a world-class brand with an exceptional reputation for innovation, engineering excellence and customer success," said Frank Jachetta, CEO of MultiDyne. "This acquisition represents a natural and highly strategic extension of our business. MultiDyne has long been focused on the transport, processing and management of video, audio and data signals. MRMC places us at the point of image acquisition itself, allowing us to participate in a much broader portion of the production workflow. Together, our technologies create a powerful end-to-end ecosystem for content creators, broadcasters and live production professionals worldwide."

MRMC has been involved with camera robotics and motion control for six decades, developing solutions that enable precision camera movement, automated tracking, virtual production workflows, and cinematic motion control for some of the world's leading broadcasters, filmmakers and content creators. The move comes during a milestone year for MultiDyne as the company celebrates its 50th anniversary.

The MultiDyne and MRMC product portfolios have virtually no overlap. Instead, the two companies serve many of the same customers, channel partners, and markets with complementary technologies. MultiDyne's fiber-optic transport, camera interface, and signal processing solutions are widely used throughout professional production environments to move video, audio, and data across complex infrastructures. MRMC's robotic camera systems, tracking solutions, motion control rigs, and automated production technologies complement those workflows by controlling the physical movement, positioning, and automation of the cameras themselves.

The combined portfolio will strengthen MultiDyne's value proposition across broadcast television, sports production, digital cinema, virtual production, corporate AV, houses of worship, live events and emerging content creation markets. The acquisition also significantly strengthens MultiDyne's international presence, particularly in Europe, where MRMC has built a respected global brand and loyal customer base. MultiDyne plans to maintain MRMC's operations in the United Kingdom while preserving the engineering expertise, product innovation and customer relationships that have made the company a trusted partner throughout the industry.

"MRMC has earned tremendous loyalty throughout the broadcast and cinema industries because of its innovation, product quality and commitment to customer success," said Neil Maycock, a member of the MultiDyne leadership team, who will now run MRMC as managing director. "Our priority is ensuring continuity for customers, partners and ongoing projects while creating a strong foundation for future growth. We see tremendous opportunities to expand the reach of MRMC technologies through MultiDyne's global sales channels, customer relationships and long-term investment strategy."

First, I must say, from my perspective, InfoComm 2026 was outstanding. The official numbers reported by AVIXA show that attendance was down seven percent from the IC show in Las Vegas in 2024, but you wouldn’t know it from the crowded booths. And when I talked to manufacturers, the overwhelming consensus was that while booth traffic might have been slightly off, there were more focused attendees and fewer tire-kickers. I was pleased to see that the percentage of end-users attending was higher than in previous years.

This was the first InfoComm held in the recently renovated Las Vegas Convention Center. Thank you, thank you, thank you to LVCC for the beautiful new space and air-conditioned hallways, and to AVIXA for creating a great experience. The main lobby was inviting, energizing, and engaging. Not having to walk twenty minutes between halls meant I could see more booths, and I actually had more energy. Rather than being totally wiped on Friday, I had a spring in my step (but that could have been my stormtrooper suit).

AI is No Longer a Buzzword (or two)

I don’t need to tell you that AI is advancing at warp speed. But let’s take it down a notch and relate it to our industry and the positive impact it can have in many areas.

If embraced with intent and the proper context provided, the use of AI assistants, facilitators, or agents in meeting, collaboration, and education spaces can increase productivity.

And, for the moment, let’s forget about hybrid versus all-in at the office, because AI-enabled collaboration spaces apply to all scenarios.

First things first. I think we can all agree that high-quality audio is foundational to the success of AI-enabled collaboration spaces. AI is about receiving clean data to deliver actionable data. Good enough audio is NOT good enough. Josh Blalock, director, Alliances & Engagement at Shure, said, "In the era of AI and particularly as we shift deeper into the agentic side of things, having crystal clear audio being passed from the spoken word into the platform that is processing that transcript and who said what and all that on the back end is 100% in focus and important right now." For anyone thinking that 95% is a pretty good average for accuracy, Blalock countered, "That's 5% that you're missing, and that 5% can change the entire context of what was just said. It could be leaving out who owns a task. If we're not clearly identifying every single person that said something, then the data is not as useful."

If you’re ready to embrace it, AI can be enormously helpful with programming, deployment, troubleshooting, upgrading, and monitoring of systems and devices. And that doesn’t mean eliminating jobs. It’s about making your job more efficient.

Kendra Philips, senior vice president of Sales at Legrand | AV, said, “Our new Unified Cloud Platform brings AI-driven remote monitoring and management to the AV stack, giving integrators visibility, predictive insight, and recurring managed service revenue opportunities that didn’t exist before.”

I stopped by the DVIGear booth to learn more about DisplayNet Connect for AI Agents for AV over IP signal distribution platforms. “We are taking the parts of an AV over IP project that have traditionally required deep API expertise—writing integrations, building control UIs, and debugging issues in the field—and making them accessible through the same AI tools our customers already use every day,” said Steven Barlow, president of DVIGear.

ENCO demonstrated enSpeak as part of a complete multilingual communication workflow that combines live captioning, real-time text translation, and AI-powered voice synthesis into a seamless end-to-end solution.

At InfoComm, the AI-enabled and AI enabler solutions were endless.

Remember, it’s about the data.

Eyes and Ears, Everywhere

The immense number of “videobars” shown at InfoComm this year was, let’s say, noticeable. Actually, it seemed like they multiplied like rabbits. That said, with AI being deployed fast and furious in collaboration and education spaces, the more the merrier. And they’re not all created equal.

Huddly’s C1 Crew is Microsoft Teams certified and comes as a complete kit: one C1 videobar, two Crew Add-On Cameras, cabling, mounting hardware, an Ethernet switch, and runs Edge AI onboard, working as one system. Barco announced the solution with its new wireless room system bundle developed in partnership with Huddly and Certified for Microsoft Teams. The solution combines ClickShare Hub Pro with the Huddly C1 video bar, bringing effortless wireless conferencing and presentation to small to medium-sized rooms.

And, as mentioned, I firmly believe audio is the most important element in a collaboration. At InfoComm, many audio companies upped the ante with new solutions and revisions to already great products.

David Missall, insights manager, consultant, and technical application engineer manager at Sennheiser, said, “Our philosophy is simple: Build flexible, scalable tools grounded in real customer needs and empower users to connect and collaborate through exceptional sound.” This vision included the TeamConnect Ceiling M Plus (TCC M Plus), a new ceiling microphone that combines premium audio performance with a new generation of features designed to reduce deployment effort, simplify system configuration, and scale easily. A new capability included with TCC M Plus is PartnerLink, Sennheiser’s integration feature designed to simplify how microphones are configured within leading AV platforms.

All for One, and All-In-Ones for Everybody

The term “all-in-one” is used freely to describe a combination of technologies engineered into one form factor for ease-of-use for integrators, AV/IT managers and end-users. From display manufacturers to collaboration device and solution companies, there was no shortage of unified solutions.

Display manufacturers often put the “All-in-One” moniker in the product name.

Sony showed its new entry into the category, the Crystal LED UNIFY All-in-One display. "Expanding our portfolio to include a 135-inch All-in-One model helps us meet customer demand, makes our solutions easier to spec and deploy, and serves as the perfect complement and extension to enhance our existing lineup while adding compatibility and consistency across our integrated pro AV family of solutions," said Rich Ventura, vice president, Professional Display Solutions, Sony Electronics.

“From all-in-one dvLED systems to foldable LED displays, we’re rethinking how large-scale displays are installed and maintained, reducing time, effort, and uncertainty for AV and IT managers alike,” said Shane Roma, technical product manager of dvLED and Commercial Displays at ViewSonic.

The Q-SYS RoomSuite Collaboration Bar is a Windows-based device, certified for Microsoft Teams. The solution features four high-resolution 50 MP cameras and a 16-element microphone array and is bundled with an 11-inch touchscreen controller. While it offers standard collaboration features, its true value lies in its integration with the wider Q-SYS Platform via Q-SYS Reflect. "It’s so much more than bar," said Sanjay Kulkarni, VP of Product for QSC. "It’s a context-generating endpoint that feeds into the cognitive cloud layer of our platform, capable of generating insights and actions across the enterprise."

The Ecosystem

Discussing an “ecosystem” has been a growing trend, but I noticed a more expanded role. Why not have your ecosystem talk to my ecosystem and be part of a larger, transparent ecosystem, and so on?

“Xyte is focusing on unified cloud management, automation, and AI-assisted operations,” said Omer Brookstein, chief executive officer and co-founder of Xyte. At InfoComm, the company demonstrated how AV/IT teams can centralize device data, automate routine actions, schedule operational workflows, and use the Xyte CLI to create a consistent, auditable language for people, scripts, and AI agents. “Our philosophy is that AI in AV should not be a demo trick; it should help teams reduce downtime, control cost, improve room readiness, and make every action traceable. The next phase of AV/IT management is not just smarter dashboards; it is governed execution across the full device fleet—from the cloud to the room.”

MDEP

Barco, Crestron, Jabra, Optoma, and QSC were among the many manufacturers that announced products and solutions that included or were built on the MDEP Android-based platform.

The Microsoft Device Ecosystem Platform (MDEP) is the Android-based platform from Microsoft that enables device manufacturers and software developers to deliver innovative solutions, backed by Microsoft's reputation for security, trust, and management. Built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP), the platform is designed to be extended and customized for both hardware and software solutions.

Mark Yang, group CEO at Optoma Corporation, said, "We are thrilled to become part of the MDEP community, which is an important endorsement for Optoma. As part of MDEP, Optoma will focus on developing and evolving a portfolio of enterprise-grade visual solutions designed for shared workspaces, collaboration environments, and digital signage applications—prioritizing interoperability, security, manageability, and scalability."

More Trends

My counterpart in crime, Mark J. Pescatore, SCN’s content director, covered more trends from InfoComm 2026 that you should check out.

Sustainability is not a new innovation in Pro AV. The industry has long strived to reduce its carbon footprint for a greener tomorrow, whether that be replacing packaging to more biodegradable products or advancing the longevity and recyclability of hardware solutions. There have been major advances in just a few years, but there is much work to be done.

Recently, SAVe has been front and center in the Pro AV sustainability revolution. Since its founding in 2022, the nonprofit has seen progress within the AV industry toward meeting the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. "But let’s be honest," said Tim Alevizos, SAVe board member and co-chair of marketing and PR, "the scope of the challenge we’re facing is gigantic. If the 2030 SDGs are to be achieved, it’s going to take a concerted global effort that goes well beyond what we can achieve in the AV sector."

Whether it is events like the SAVe 2026 Global Conference (coming this October) or manufacturers making impactful changes, SAVe applauds incremental progress and efforts to reduce e-waste and longevity of products. However, as Alevizos explained, SAVe is a catalyst for change on a larger scale.

"To fulfill our mission, we need more volunteers—and, specifically, more leaders—to step up for the sake of future generations and, indeed, the planet itself," he noted. "Our advice is for people in our industry, and far outside it, to take action as individuals and as organizations, but not to step there: We need to act collectively in a broader sense, and that requires leaders who can inspire, educate, unite, and organize people and resources to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development."

Here is how some companies are paving the way for reaching these goals.

'Ecofficient' and Paper Packaging

Extron has made sustainability a major focal point. Its Ecofficient initiative, developed in response to the sunsetting of the ENERGY STAR program for commercial AV devices, spotlights energy-efficient excellence across its entire AV product portfolio. It signals Extron’s ongoing commitment to reducing power consumption, lowering operating costs, and supporting global sustainability goals.

“At Extron, we’ve always believed that sustainability and performance go hand in hand," said Joe da Silva, VP of marketing, Extron. "Opportunities for sustainability and conservation are evaluated at every step of a product’s life, from power supply designs leveraging GaN [gallium nitrade] technology for cooler and more efficient operation, to shipping materials optimized for recyclability, to our product recycling program that minimizes landfill waste."

One way to reduce Pro AV's environmental footprint is about how the technology is delivered. Switching to eco-friendly packaging is big step, reducing shipping costs and providing much greener transport.

Lightware Visual Engineering, which has already reduced its carbon footprint by designing and manufacturing its solutions in a centralized headquarters, switched to all-paper packaging in the next step of its ESG strategy. The biodegradable, recyclable paper-only packaging will be used for Taurus UCX, Taurus TPX, Taurus TPN, OPTX, and OPTN products. Packaging is still secure, yet it offers plenty of benefits for a greener tomorrow.

Sustainable and Socially Responsible

Sustainability has long been a part of the PPDS philosophy. The display manufacturer was eco-conscious before it was trendy in Pro AV. PPDS focuses on low-energy solutions with long-lasting shelf life. For example, PPDS e-paper solutions, like the Philips Tableaux, save energy and maximize technology uses, further reducing a carbon footprint.

As the saying goes, the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree.

Last August, TPV Technology, the parent company behind PPDS as well as TP Vision, MMD Monitors and Displays, and AOC, earned the EcoVadis Platinum Medal. Founded in 2007, EcoVadis provides business ratings, having screened more than three million companies across 185 countries, awarding bronze, silver, gold, or platinum honors. The platinum recognition places TPV Technology in the top 1% globally as one of the most sustainable and socially responsible manufacturers in Pro AV.

Not long ago, Kinly's net-zero targets were validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). This achievement—which, per Kinly, made it the first global systems integrator to have the honor—validates the work the company has done towards achieving "net-zero greenhouse gas emissions across the value chain by 2050; reducing absolute scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions 54.6% by 2033 from a 2023 base year, as well as scope 3 GHG emissions by 61.1% per EUR value added within the same timeframe," according to a recent release.

It isn't simply big displays and packaging that are focused on enhancing the carbon footprint. Last summer, L-Acoustics invested in French-based MagREEsource. Per the company's report on the partnership, it introduces a "breakthrough circular economy model for the professional audio industry" that focuses on magnet recycling and manufacturing technology.

There are many hands in the pot helping to stir a greener future in Pro AV. And that is exactly what SAVe's goal continues to be. "It won’t be easy," Alevizos admitted. "Systemic change is required. But there is strength in numbers, and we have the numbers on our side to create the groundswell necessary to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. We won’t be satisfied until the potential of our movement for change is fully realized."

It was a busy week in Pro AV as 12 people were either appointed or promoted to new positions. There were also key partnerships secured from AVI-SPL, Neat and Kinly, Yealink, and several others.

[Survey Open for SCN Top AV Consultants]

Get caught up with what you may have missed at InfoComm in this week's newsmakers.

People News

Anthony James Partners Names Michael Martin Chief Technology Officer

Anthony James Partners (AJP) has named Michael Martin chief technology officer (CTO). Martin has led AJP’s broadcast systems and network infrastructure practice for nearly two decades. As CTO, he is focused on guiding the company's technology strategy across all disciplines while continuing to oversee the planning and design of integrated systems across the firm's project portfolio.

Martin specializes in SMPTE ST 2110 IP-based production environments, broadcast control rooms, network architecture, and large-scale fiber and structured cabling infrastructure. With more than 44 years of industry experience, he has led the design and development of broadcast systems for some of the largest and most complex sports and entertainment venues in North America, delivering modern IP-based control rooms and technical infrastructure engineered to support high-density workflows and long-term scalability.

d&b audiotechnik Announces David Servinis as Regional Manager for Ontario

d&b audiotechnik appointed David Servinis to the position of regional manager, Ontario. In this new role, Servinis is responsible for supporting and growing the d&b presence across the Ontario market by working closely with partners, integrators, consultants, and end users throughout the region.

Servinis brings an extensive background in the professional audio and music industries to d&b audiotechnik. He most recently served as the North Central territory manager in commercial acoustics for Primacoustic. Throughout his career, he has focused on relationship building, technical sales, and consultative problem-solving across a variety of music and audiovisual sales roles, including positions at MCR Rental Solutions and CCR. Servinis studied recording arts and music production at the Harris Institute and remains an active musician and guitarist in the local Hamilton music scene.

Cleerline Appoints Robin Roy as Senior Account Manager

The Cleerline Technology Group appointed Robin Roy as senior account manager, overseeing the continued development of Cleerline’s distributor network across the United States. Based in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Roy brings more than 20 years of experience in the commercial and residential AV channels, having demonstrated success in previous roles with distributors and independent sales representative organizations throughout the Atlanta region. During that time, she was introduced to Cleerline solutions and recognized early on that fiber infrastructure would become critical in meeting the growing bandwidth demands of commercial AV applications.

Russel Goodwin Promoted to VP of Engineering & Operations at C.V. Lloyde Audiovisual

C.V. Lloyde Audiovisual has promoted Russel Goodwin to VP of engineering and operations. Goodwin joined CVLAV in 2022 and has played a key role in strengthening the company’s engineering capabilities and operational excellence. Most recently serving as director of engineering, he has helped guide the successful design and deployment of complex audiovisual systems for sports and entertainment facilities across North America.

In his new role, Goodwin oversees engineering and operations while continuing to support the company’s commitment to innovation, quality, and exceptional customer experience.

PJ Pedroni Appointed Senior Director of National Sales USA at digiLED

digiLED has appointed PJ Pedroni, based in Seattle, as senior director of national sales. Pedroni leads efforts to grow awareness of digiLED in new markets, highlighting the company’s global track record of delivering ambitious projects across sports, immersive experiences, attractions, and DOOH applications.

Having started his career in outdoor advertising, Pedroni traces his passion for ambitious visual experiences back to one of the defining projects of his early career: an installation in New York City. The project, located at the intersection of 42nd Street and Broadway, won "Spectacular of the Year" in 2002 and sparked a lifelong appreciation for projects that push creative boundaries and capture public imagination on a grand scale.

DMF Lighting Names Bryan Biga as VP of Residential Sales

DMF appointed Bryan Biga as VP of residential sales. Biga brings more than 25 years of residential lighting sales leadership to the role and will be responsible for leading residential sales efforts for both DMF Lighting and HK Lighting across North America.

Biga joins DMF Lighting from sister company HK Lighting, where he served as senior sales director-residential, driving new business development and building the brand’s residential channel. Throughout his career, Biga has demonstrated a consistent track record of transforming underperforming markets, developing high-performing teams, and forging lasting customer relationships. He has deep expertise in channel management, independent rep management, key account development, and sales training, capabilities that position him well to support DMF Lighting’s integrator partners and accelerate growth in the residential market.

FORTÉ Names Tobias Enders Managing Director, Europe

FORTÉ has promoted Tobias Enders to managing director, Europe, expanding his leadership responsibilities across the company’s growing European operations.

In this role, Enders serves as the central leadership point of contact for FORTÉ’s growing European Region, partnering with FORTÉ’s leadership in Ireland, the U.K., Sweden, and Germany. Enders provides more day-to-day focus on existing expansion plans, including new facilities in Frankfurt and London that will each have full Velocity meeting room solution capabilities, along with stronger coordination with FORTÉ’s technology partner network.

Enders previously owned and led GMS, an audiovisual integration business based in Frankfurt, Germany. GMS became part of FORTÉ through acquisition in April 2025. Since joining the organization, he has been instrumental in driving record growth in Germany, leading with FORTÉ’s unique managed services and innovation offerings, along with driving a new expansion effort in Munich. Enders brings expertise helping enterprise organizations create connected, productive, and future-ready workplaces. His background includes leadership roles focused on smart workplace solutions, digital services strategy, advanced analytics, and global project delivery. He holds a diploma in International Management and is a certified ITSM and Project Management Professional.

WAVIT Expands Board with Five New Visionaries

As Women in AV/IT (WAVIT) continues to expand its impact across the audiovisual and technology industries, the organization has strengthened its leadership team with the appointment of five new members to its Board of Directors and the nomination of a new VP. Joining the board are Vanessa Tolisano, Gisela Ramirez, Kristy Demsay, Kim Lonas, and Susan Milwit, while Cheryl Walton has been nominated to serve as VP.

As WAVIT enters its fourth year, the organization continues to broaden its leadership with representation across sales, operations, HR, channel partnerships, mentorship, diversity initiatives, and emerging technologies. The addition of these five leaders marks a significant milestone for WAVIT as the organization continues to expand its programs, mentorship opportunities, scholarships, and community initiatives designed to support women throughout every stage of their AV/IT careers.

Company News

AIMS Launches the Official IPMX Training Series Online

The Alliance for IP Media Solutions (AIMS) has launched its Official IPMX Training Series, a free online program designed to help the Pro AV community better understand, design, configure, and deploy IPMX-based AV over IP systems. The Official IPMX Training Series is structured across three progressive levels, Foundations, Systems, and Networks, providing a clear learning path that supports both newcomers to AV over IP and experienced professionals seeking deeper technical insight.

The courses will balance demonstrations with business and technical information, helping participants understand not only how IPMX works, but how it fits into real-world workflows. The curriculum will also explore how IPMX relates to and builds upon complementary standards such as AES67, SMPTE ST 2110, and AMWA NMOS, while providing insight into the ecosystem clusters emerging around open, interoperable AV over IP deployments.

AVI-SPL Launches Autonomous Freight Operations, Announces New Partnerships

AVI-SPL has started commercial autonomous freight operations between Dallas and Houston using the Volvo VNL Autonomous powered by the Aurora Driver. The operations will support AVI-SPL’s freight movement and reflect the company’s continued investment in operational innovation and supply chain strategies designed to improve scalability, reliability, and long-term efficiency.

The collaboration marks an important step in demonstrating how autonomous trucking can be applied in real-world logistics operations where speed, consistency, and reliability are critical. As demand for freight capacity continues to grow, autonomous transport has the potential to strengthen supply chains through greater uptime, improved asset utilization, and enhanced cargo security.

Additionally, AVI-SPL expanded operations in Costa Rica, Australia, and Switzerland. The expansion reflects AVI-SPL’s continued global growth strategy and investment in delivering consistent customer experiences, local expertise, and scalable support across international markets. The expanded presence in Costa Rica, Australia, and Switzerland enables AVI-SPL to better support regional customers while also strengthening service delivery capabilities for global enterprise clients operating across multiple countries and time zones.

Neat and Kinly to Accelerate Intelligent Platform Deployment

Neat and Kinly announced a global partnership during InfoComm 2026. Kinly has been designated a Mastery partner, the highest tier in Neat’s Global Partner Program, specifically for its technical expertise and global enterprise deployment capabilities.

The strategic alliance instantly mobilizes Neat’s video portfolio with Kinly’s global network of customers, providing a single, standardized, end-to-end solution for enterprise modernization. This collaboration ensures customers worldwide can seamlessly deploy intelligent meeting room technology to transform their workplace collaboration environments.

nsign Partners with BrightSign on Expanded Digital Signage Deployment

nsign partnered with BrightSign at InfoComm 2026, expanding the deployment options available to customers, integrators and channel partners worldwide. The partnership highlights nsign's international growth strategy, particularly in North America, where BrightSign media players are widely deployed across enterprise digital signage networks in sectors such as retail, quick service restaurants (QSR), hospitality, transportation, and corporate communications.

By supporting selected BrightSign media players, nsign can now be deployed on both new and existing BrightSign-based infrastructures, allowing organizations to adopt the platform without replacing previously installed hardware. This provides a practical migration path for companies looking to modernize their digital signage operations while protecting existing technology investments.

For AV integrators and channel partners, the integration expands the range of deployment scenarios available to customers. Many large multi-site organizations already operate BrightSign-based networks and are increasingly looking for CMS platforms that combine ease of use, centralized management, scalability, and remote device control.

SFM Named Canadian Distributor for Yealink Video Conferencing Solutions

SFM was appointed the Canadian distributor for Yealink. The agreement enables SFM to bring Yealink's full suite of professional video conferencing products to market across Canada, offering resellers and system integrators direct access to one of the world's most trusted collaboration technology portfolios. The portfolio addresses a wide spectrum of deployment environments —from compact huddle spaces to executive boardrooms and large-scale enterprise installations—ensuring resellers can match the right solution to every client requirement.

The appointment reflects the complementary strengths of both organizations. SFM brings specialized knowledge of the Canadian Unified Communication technology landscape, a proven distribution network, and long-standing relationships within the AV and unified communications channel. Yealink, ranked among the world’s top videoconferencing solution providers, delivers enterprise-grade technology deployed by organizations across more than 140 countries—solutions engineered to support the demands of modern hybrid work environments at any scale.

Pro AV Around the World

The Cleerline Technology Group announced the appointment of Quartz AVA as the distributor for its optic solutions across the Benelux region (Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg). For over 30 years, Quartz AVA has been a value-added distributor of premium audiovisual and custom integration technologies. Based in the Netherlands and serving a network of dealers, integrators, and home cinema specialists, Quartz AVA provides comprehensive technical support, training, logistics, and project guidance across the region.

SpinetiX appointed ALGAM Enterprise as SpinetiX distribution partner for France, Monaco, and North African countries such as Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia. ALGAM Enterprise offers the full SpinetiX portfolio and provides field commercial, technical, and consultative support to system integrators and channel partners delivering demanding large digital signage projects across the territory.

While Las Vegas turned up temperatures for InfoComm 2026, the show made its own heat. There was serious energy on the show floor, with plenty of exhibitors, presentations, and experiences to keep attendees engaged. The completed renovations to the Las Vegas Convention Center helped traffic flow between the Work (Central Hall) and Play (North Hall) areas, with free session spaces and other attractions positioned between the two.

[What's the Buzz? How InfoComm Has Changed in Five Years]

First, let's talk about those show numbers. I said it on the show floor and I'll stand by my assessment: Attendance was fine. Not record-breaking, not a disaster. Fine. Normal. Within acceptable parameters.

The official numbers back me up. According to AVIXA, there were 28,132 verified attendees (35,707 total registrants). International attendance accounted for 20% of attendees, with representation from 94 countries. There were also 807 exhibitors.

How does that compare to last year's effort in Orlando, FL? InfoComm 2025 attracted 817 exhibitors, which was down from 833 in 2024. So, yes, there's a small downward trend, but 807 still gave attendees plenty to experience.

Orlando attendance was 30,998, and InfoComm 2024 in Las Vegas was 30,271, which reported 23% international attendance. That little nugget of data is important. Based on these numbers, a quick bit of math shows me the show lost about 1,300 international attendees from the last time we all gathered in Las Vegas, which represents roughly 60% of the attendee loss.

What kept them away? Was it outrageous travel costs? International unrest? The growing popularity of ISE in Barcelona? Methinks it's all of the above.

Speaking of numbers, Michael Sullivan-Trainor, AVIXA’s senior industry analyst, reported during the show that growth in the Pro AV industry has slowed from 5.4% to 3.9%, but it's still ahead of GDP in most countries. Even more encouraging: Pro AV buyers are increasing budget growth expectation this year. Here are a couple of other things I noticed on the show floor.

Don't sleep on virtual production.

If you haven't heard, there's a buzzword gaining momentum in Pro AV: broadcast AV. (You can get some insights from our recent ebook, AV for Broadcast.) During a presentation for media covering the show, Sullivan-Trainor said the growing broadcast AV market is changing the way the industry is looking at delivering AV. In fact, broadcast production rooms that deliver high production values are being adopted across other verticals, including corporate, government, healthcare, education, and more.

According to Trainor, the core principles of broadcast AV include workflows that offer repeatable execution, not just ad hoc operations, with enterprise-first designs that are focused on business teams and are aligned with IT requirements. And virtual production is a "very important" part of the growing broadcast AV market segment. He mentioned one company that embraced virtual production and was producing content 30% faster as well as 40% more content. That kind of ROI is hard to ignore.

Sony gets it. The company has developed a comprehensive virtual production ecosystem, and partnered with Vū Tampa Bay to demonstrate a setup designed for corporate users during the show. The solution featured Sony's CAPRI modular dvLED display, which can be upgraded to a VERONA display with a lower pixel pitch and deeper blacks. Both are purpose-built Sony Crystal LEDs for virtual production. The demo also had a BRC-AM7 PTZ camera with AI integration for tracking and facial recognition.

Jaime Raffone, senior sales manager, virtual production, Sony, said the demand for virtual production at the corporate level is "growing exponentially," because it offers a "very easy point of entry." Many financial and Fortune 500 companies have already adopted virtual production workflows and are now building out their facilities for more complex productions. "Content is still king," Raffone offered, adding that virtual production provides an "easier, more immersive way to build their brand."

A virtual production set was also part of the Smart Workplace, which was powered by FORTÉ and showcased modern office technologies. It was one of three new immersive experiences at the show; there was also the Pitch, powered by Diversified, which provided a look at the modern fan experience, while the Retail Experience demonstrated how Pro AV technologies are influencing consumer engagement in physical retail environments.

Stop trying to bury the projector business.

Yes, the projector business is not en fuego. Robert Ambrose, CEO and co-founder of Caretta Research, took a quick look at the numbers for me. The market is not showing a positive trend; in fact, it's on the decline at a roughly 5% drop annually. But it ain't dead yet.

According to Petro Shimonishi, director of new business development and business transformation for Panasonic Projector & Display Americas, the market oscillates between flat and declining, depending on the year. Except this year—because sales are up. She's seeing customers "boomerang" from dvLED solutions due to the cost and complexities of maintenance issues.

Panasonic is also investing in a new projector technology. VIVID PRIME is a RGB laser light source technology that's designed to eliminate the "rainbow effect" without introducing new imaging issues. The new PT-HTQ20 4K projector is the company's first to feature VIVID PRIME, and is designed to appeal to museums, themed entertainment, and immersive experiences. Shimonishi said the company is also seeing new interest from golf simulation systems that rely on projectors. Obviously, you can't launch a golf ball at a dvLED display—or at least not more than once.

Joel St-Denis, director of project management at Christie, admitted concerts and live events have been "taken over" by LED. However, he said, "There's still growth in certain areas." Fixed installations are a bright spot, particularly with projectors in the 8,000-12,000 lumen market space. St-Denis said these models, including Christie's new Korus Series, are bright enough to punch through ambient light while providing competitive price points.

And then there's projection mapping. Scalable Display Technologies had a patriotic demonstration of projection mapping on a scaled version of Mount Rushmore at its booth. From monuments to historic structures, projection mapping brings existing spaces to life. "I think it's reinvigorating production," said James Pietsch, director of global accounts, Scalable Display Technologies.

ViewSonic launched its LSD Series of laser projectors in May and had three models on display at InfoComm. Jeff Muto, business line director, ViewSonic, said the lumens-per-dollar ratio has improved with the company's third-generation laser technology, so ViewSonic can deliver a more viable product for schools and small businesses. (And yes, they have a dedicated Golf Mode, too. I sense another trend.)

Muto also admitted the professional projector market is "slowing," but with relatively few projector manufacturers in the industry, there's no reason to abandon the technology. And slowing doesn't mean stopped; globally, this is still a multi-billion dollar industry. So, plenty of sales, new technological developments, new products, and new potential markets and applications. Sure doesn't sound like a dead market segment to me.

Following the announcement at InfoComm 2026 that Optoma had joined the Microsoft Device Ecosystem Platform (MDEP) community, Group CEO Mark Yang sat down with AV Technology Content Director Cindy Davis to discuss the pivotal milestone and his strategic vision for the company.

Watch the full interview below.

By aligning Optoma’s visual solutions with the Microsoft security and management framework, the company aims to better serve the evolving needs of the enterprise market. Yang emphasized that today’s customers require visual solutions that integrate seamlessly into existing IT environments, shifting away from the limitations of standalone devices. This integration ensures that Optoma’s products are scalable, secure, and easier to manage for IT professionals.

[Optoma Announces Joining the Microsoft Device Ecosystem Platform (MDEP)]

Looking ahead, Yang outlined a three-year vision to transform Optoma into a global technology powerhouse. Central to this strategy is the delivery of intelligent, trustworthy products that aim to "impress, amaze and move" its users.

Yang outlined a roadmap comprising three tenets. AI Integration: Exploring how AI can enhance collaboration, communication, and professional efficiency. Simplified UX: Prioritizing user experience to make deployment and management seamless for system integrators, IT administrators, and end users. Ecosystem Expansion: Moving beyond standalone hardware to develop a broader, more value-driven ecosystem.

Under Yang’s leadership, Optoma is positioning itself to become an essential partner for its customers, delivering a future defined by intelligent, interconnected technology solutions.

Watch the full interview.

Bose Professional unveiled a preview of its new global brand identity, 802 LABS, at InfoComm 2026. The company shared plans for a phased transition beginning in February 2027 and concluding in 2028. No changes will take effect until that time, giving the company time to work closely with partners and affiliates to prepare for the new identity.

The “802” name pays homage to the newly independent company’s origins and its first iconic product, the 802 loudspeaker. “LABS” symbolizes the company's commitment to engineering excellence and the spirit of curiosity that has defined the company’s culture since its inception.

John Maier, CEO, said the new name "honors where we’ve been and gives us space to build what’s next. The 802 LABS identity is personal for our team because it connects directly to our history of innovation and engineering excellence. We’re excited about this opportunity to define who we are for the future."

Since becoming an independent company in 2023, Bose Professional has rebuilt the organization around the needs of integrators and system designers. Over the past three years, the company has launched more than 25 new products and opened more than a dozen offices and experience centers worldwide, including its new headquarters in Boston.

“Building a new brand platform on a 50-year legacy gives us a chance to be clear about what sets us apart and what we stand for," Maier added. "As 802 LABS, our purpose is simple: make great sound effortless. This change is the next step in our journey, and we're already hard at work on what comes next.”

For years, single-use batteries have been treated as a background issue in Pro AV. They’re small, relatively inexpensive, and easy to replace, so most teams just get on with the job. But ask an audio engineer, stage manager, or facilities technician how many AA or AAA batteries their organization actually uses in a year, and many struggle to answer with confidence.

That’s understandable. Battery consumption builds quietly in the background—a few wireless microphones on stage, some beltpacks, or a handful of in-ear receivers for every rehearsal, show, or corporate presentation. But across live production, broadcast, theater, house of worship, and corporate venues, those numbers add up quickly.

I’ve spent years working in the touring industry. I’ve seen firsthand just how reliant our industry is on disposable batteries. They remain a practical and universal power source for pro audio equipment. That won’t change overnight. But the scale of battery waste today—and the financial and environmental costs attached to it—mean it’s time to think more seriously about how batteries are managed, tracked, and replaced.

A Numbers Game

At my own production company, Sonic City, we operate 74 channels of wireless equipment. In a typical year, that translates to more than 20,000 single-use batteries. That’s a fairly common story for medium-sized touring and production operations.

The wider industry picture is more striking. Norwegian cultural institution Kulturrom estimated several years ago that Norway’s entertainment sector alone uses more than 1 million disposable batteries annually across concert venues, touring productions, theatres, and cultural events.

Norway is a small market.

Scale that globally and the numbers become hard to ignore. In the United States alone, it’s widely estimated that around 3 billion batteries are discarded every year, many of them standard alkaline AA and AAA batteries used in everyday electronics and Pro AV equipment.

It’s not down to an AV integrator or venue manager to solve the global battery crisis. What they can influence is how much they spend on batteries and what their environmental impact looks like.

The first step is tracking battery usage properly. Many teams don’t have enough visibility into how many batteries are being purchased, stored, used, and discarded across productions or facilities. Once those numbers are added up alongside purchasing costs, disposal requirements, and day-to-day operational pressure, battery management becomes a serious business issue.

Integrators, venues, and production teams need to ask the tough questions. Start counting batteries. Estimate annual consumption. Understand the cost attached to that usage. Even a rough baseline can quickly highlight opportunities to reduce waste, simplify workflows, and lower long-term expenditure.

Current Status

The pro audio market offers several approaches to rechargeables. Major manufacturers such as Shure and Sennheiser have developed highly capable proprietary charging ecosystems designed for their own wireless systems. They’re fantastic for reliability and visibility, but can introduce additional cost and lock users in a single vendor environment.

Then you have standard consumer rechargeables. While they’re adequate for low-drain household devices, traditional 1.2V NiMH batteries struggle to meet the reliability needs of demanding professional environments. In live production, there’s no room for uncertainty. A wireless mic dropping out during a service, keynote presentation, or live performance isn’t acceptable.

Those issues are being addressed. Advances in rechargeable battery technology, particularly lithium-ion systems designed for professional use, are helping tackle longstanding concerns around runtime predictability, charging speed, and voltage.

Operational realities are also pushing things forward. Touring crews, venue technicians, and corporate AV teams are expected to do more with fewer people and tighter turnaround times. Reducing last-minute battery runs, simplifying charging workflows, and increasing runtime makes work easier.

Recycling matters, regardless of the battery. A recent EPA report to Congress cited recycling rates for alkaline batteries at just 4%. That means the overwhelming majority end up in landfill, not recovery.

In Europe, the EU Battery Regulation 2023/1542 introduced stricter sustainability, collection, and recycling requirements across the battery lifecycle, including a target to collect 73% of waste portable batteries by the end of 2030. It's a more fragmented story in the United States, but states like California, New York, and New Hampshire have introduced stricter rules around recycling and disposal, increasing pressure on businesses and end users to adopt more sustainable battery practices.

Charging Smarter

Broadcast, music, house of worship, and corporate AV are all environments where battery reliability and operational efficiency matter. Several broadcasters, audio rental companies, and churches in Europe are taking a rechargeable-first approach. Similar thinking is emerging in orchestral environments, where consistency and reliability are essential for rehearsals, recordings, and live performances.

Touring engineers are also looking at the issue from a logistics standpoint. For audio crews working internationally, reducing battery swaps, simplifying charging, and traveling with less gear makes a demanding schedule a little more bearable.

The AV industry has transformed how it approaches remote production, AV/IT workflows, cloud—and yes, AI. Battery management is a practical issue that we’ve been too slow to address. Relying entirely on proprietary systems or single-use power sources in an industry increasingly focused on interoperability and ROI no longer feels sustainable.

The encouraging part is that this is a solvable problem. Better tracking, smarter charging workflows, improved recycling practices, and greater awareness can all make a measurable difference to the bottom line and working culture.

For an industry built on reliability, preparation, and technical precision, battery management can no longer remain an afterthought. The teams that approach it more strategically will reduce waste, lower operational costs, and make day-to-day production workflows easier in the process.

Optoma has announced it has joined the Microsoft Device Ecosystem Platform (MDEP) community. The company is a leader in projection, large-format and interactive display technologies, spanning digital signage, LED video walls, interactive flat panels and professional projectors for retail, education, corporate and public venues.

This milestone marks a significant step in Optoma’s strategy to deliver secure, scalable and enterprise-ready visual solutions that integrate seamlessly into Microsoft-managed workplace environments. Through its participation in MDEP, Optoma is aligning its future product platforms with Microsoft’s device, security and management standards to better support modern workspaces, meeting rooms and in-building digital signage.

MDEP is an enterprise-grade software platform built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). Designed to meet the highest standards of security, reliability, ease of deployment, and innovation, MDEP gives enterprises and device makers a consistent, customer-ready foundation for building and deploying devices at scale. By joining the MDEP community, Optoma is strengthening its ability to deliver solutions that meet the evolving requirements of IT, AV and facilities teams operating within Microsoft-centric environments.

“We are thrilled to become part of the MDEP community, which is an important endorsement for Optoma,” said Mark Yang, Group CEO at Optoma Corporation.

“This community with the MDEP Team reflects our strategic shift towards platform-led, IT-aligned visual solutions that integrate naturally into the Microsoft workplace ecosystem.”

“As part of MDEP, Optoma will focus on developing and evolving a portfolio of enterprise-grade visual solutions designed for shared workspaces, collaboration environments and digital signage applications — prioritizing interoperability, security, manageability and scalability.”

"Optoma joining the MDEP community reflects the growing momentum behind enterprise-grade, devices for modern workplaces. We look forward to working with Optoma to expand the range of trusted visual and digital signage solutions available to our mutual customers," said Juha Kuosmanen, General Manager, MDEP, at Microsoft Corporation.

Optoma plans to collaborate closely with Microsoft as part of the MDEP, with further updates on product direction, ecosystem integrations and go-to-market activity to be shared in due course.

Across modern workplaces, lecture halls, and collaboration environments, AV and IT systems are becoming more closely intertwined. What was a once a simple plug-and-play relationship has transformed into a vast web of interconnected devices, all competing for resources on the network.

This new landscape has led both AV and IT professionals to greater collaboration, but it's not without its challenges. One of the most significant issues is the absence of clear, continuous visibility into how networked technology behaves, especially across multi-site deployments.

As networked audio systems scale across hybrid workforces and multi-building estates, traditional methods of on-site monitoring and room-by-room oversight are unable to keep pace with operational demands. When teams lack a centralized view of device health, configuration status, and performance conditions, they are effectively working blind, leaving them to react to issues only after they disrupt communication.

Emerging Solutions

To address this shift in expectations, the industry has accelerated toward cloud-based device management. Visibility has become the foundation of reliability, enabling teams to anticipate problems instead of responding to them. This visibility helps AV/IT teams to understand their audio infrastructure as a unified living system rather than a series of isolated endpoints. In environments where uptime is essential, the ability to observe device behavior, detect inconsistencies, maintain firmware alignment, and track overall performance from any location has become a defining requirement for successful operations.

A new generation of centralized management platforms is emerging to solve this challenge. These platforms, currently in development across the industry, are designed to unify device oversight into a single, intuitive interface accessible from any location. They enable secure, role-based management across teams and campuses, allowing organizations to organize rooms and devices in ways that reflect how their environments function.

By operating entirely through a web browser, they streamline deployment and remove installation barriers, offering fast, flexible management for integrators, IT staff, and AV teams alike. While these systems represent meaningful progress, their deeper significance comes from how they evolve after launch. Cloud-based platforms do not remain static; they become living ecosystems shaped by the organizations that use them.

Real-time diagnostics, usage patterns, and operational insights create a feedback loop that informs future development. Instead of guessing what features customers may need, developers gain continuous visibility into emerging behaviors and challenges, enabling smarter, more targeted enhancements. Over several years, such platforms often become far more capable than anyone could have forecast at the outset.

Let's Add AI

As cloud-based visibility becomes the norm, the next phase of evolution will be defined by intelligence layered on top of that visibility. Centralized platforms already aggregate telemetry, configuration data, and performance indicators across distributed environments. As these data sets mature, they create the foundation for intelligent systems that can interpret conditions, recognize patterns, and recommend—or initiate—action. Rather than simply presenting status information, future management layers will increasingly function as active participants in system operations, reducing the burden on AV and IT teams and shortening the distance between insight and resolution.

Advances in AI agents and large language model–driven orchestration point toward a future where device management becomes intent-based rather than task-based. Instead of manually interrogating individual endpoints, teams will define outcomes—maintaining audio consistency across rooms, validating system readiness before meetings, or isolating anomalies before users notice them—and intelligent agents will handle the underlying complexity. Enabled by standardized APIs and secure context-sharing protocols, these agents will be able to understand device states, correlate events across vendors and systems, and execute corrective workflows autonomously while remaining governed by enterprise security and authorization policies.

This shift will further blur the traditional boundaries between AV, IT, and building systems. As intelligent management layers gain the ability to reason across audio, networking, control, and collaboration platforms, networked audio will no longer operate as an isolated discipline.

Instead, it will become part of a broader, software-defined environment in which performance, reliability, and user experience are continuously optimized by systems designed to learn and adapt over time. In this context, long-term value will be driven less by static feature sets and more by openness, interoperability, and the ability to participate in intelligent ecosystems that evolve alongside the organizations they support.

As hybrid work continues to expand and distributed learning becomes more entrenched, this shift will influence the entire lifecycle of networked audio deployments. Visibility will become as essential as sound quality, and the ability to oversee devices remotely will be viewed not as an advanced feature but as a baseline expectation. Organizations will invest in systems that can adapt over time, accommodate new spaces and workflows, and provide the kind of real-time intelligence that allows teams to stay ahead of issues rather than chasing them.

The future of networked audio will be defined by platforms that give organizations the ability to understand their environments holistically. When systems can be observed in real time, refined continuously, and secured centrally, collaboration becomes more dependable for everyone who relies on it. In an era where communication is mission-critical, the most transformative advancement is not any single device—it's the ability to finally see the entire landscape and act with confidence.

Vanco International's owner Brad Corbin has passed away. Corbin studied engineering at Georgia Tech; he joined Vanco as president in 1999 and acquired the company in 2007, spearheading its transition from a regional distributor to a trusted global provider of professional audiovisual equipment. He was 78.

Corbin helped guide the company through decades of growth and industry change. Under his leadership, Vanco was one of the first companies to introduce HDMI cables into the U.S. market. He laid the foundation for the introduction of Evolution, Vanco’s curated line of professional AV distribution products, and PulseAudio, the company’s audio accessories line. In 2017, Corbin led Vanco’s acquisition of Beale Street, expanding Vanco’s offerings to include internationally recognized premium audio products. Thanks to Corbin’s stewardship, Vanco transformed into an AV distribution and audio solutions manufacturer serving customers around the world.

In 2018, Corbin passed day-to-day leadership of Vanco to his son, Mark. He remained actively involved in the company as CEO until his passing.

“My father’s commitment to the audiovisual industry was lifelong. He built the culture of service, innovation, and ambition that drives Vanco today,” said Mark Corbin, president of Vanco International. “He was a model leader at Vanco and an even better father and grandfather. I will always be grateful for the legacy he built.”

Corbin loved fishing and golfing near his home on Amelia Island, FL, as well as spending time with his family. He reveled in being a grandfather and will be remembered for his sense of humor, larger-than-life personality, and expansive heart. He is survived by his wife of 49 years, Susan Corbin; his son Matthew Corbin and daughter-in-law Elizabeth Corbin; and son Mark Corbin, daughter-in-law Lindsey Corbin, and grandchildren Chloe, Ava, and Hayden Corbin.

On Wednesday, June 17, at 9 a.m. PT, the doors to the show floor of InfoComm 2026 will open, and I can hardly wait!

This year, I will be channeling a stormtrooper as I sprint from meeting to meeting, traversing the North and Central Halls packed with more than 800 exhibitors. I’m excited to see the new products and solutions I have been privy to during NDA interviews and the many more embargoed press releases our editors have received.

And of course, seeing people in person is absolutely the best. We've got such a great community.

The AVT Guide

Because the AV Technology Guide to InfoComm contains a great deal of embargoed information, we're putting this together at the 11^th hour. I've just finished proofreading the final pages, which represent the biggest Guide that I have worked on since starting with AVT in 2014.

More than 100 exhibitors are represented through interviews with CEOs and product managers about company roadmaps and the strategies that led to the products and solutions we'll all see on the show floor. The Guide will be released on June 17 at 9 a.m. PT.

You’ll see some common themes that have been a thread for several years. Ease of use, flexibility, and scalability have been the cornerstones of our industry. New and evolving standards hold the promise of interoperability, and then there’s AI.

Is AI ushering in a new convergence for our industry? It is certainly a disruptor, the likes that I don’t think we’ve seen before, and we’re at the precipice. Last InfoComm, most manufacturers were talking about how they were planning to implement AI, and some had solutions. This year, there’s hardly a manufacturer that hasn’t embraced AI in some way, whether through a partnership, creating AI-enabled products, or delivering solutions that work seamlessly with AI platforms.

After the conversations we had with executives to compile the guide, the products that were submitted for it, plus reading the hundreds of Best of Show at InfoComm entries (another record-breaking year), I am excited for the year ahead.

Best of Show

As always, we hire end-users, integrators, and consultants to anonymously judge new products on the show floor. In many cases, two judges will weigh in on a new product. At the last minute, we needed to hire more judges, because we got so many more entries than in previous years. All the judging is done on the first day of the show, and the editorial team stays up all night tabulating and evaluating the comments to announce the winners on Thursday morning.

3 Quick Tips

Airport Badge Pick-Up: Skip lines at the convention center and pick up your badge at the airport at these locations: Terminal 1 Baggage Claim (Across from the Starbucks), or at Terminal 3 Baggage Claim (Near Door 51)

First Time Attendee Guide: AVIXA has put together this handy guide for first time attendees. It’s invaluable!

A New Yorker Approved Deli: While the show floor occupies the North and Central Halls, the sessions and association meetings are being held in the West Hall. If you’ve got a hankering for New York-style deli, Future’s Adam Goldstein highly recommended Siegel’s Bagelmania. Located adjacent to the West Hall on Convention Center Drive, the massive 10,000-square-foot Jewish deli is legendary in Vegas. Hours: Sun-Sat 6:00 a.m. – 3:30 p.m.

Kudos to the Las Vegas Convention Center

In January 2026, LVCC opened its newly renovated North and Central Halls. Music to my ears: A climate-controlled indoor concourse now connects the North and South Halls, letting attendees move across the massive 200-acre campus entirely indoors. Dry heat or not, I don’t like the heat, and my new stormtrooper suit isn’t air-conditioned.

It was yet another busy week in Pro AV. Audix, PPDS, and Grass Valley were among those to announce strategic promotions and hires, while WAVIT announced the winners of the 2026 Mary Cook Empowerment Scholarship. And yes, there were two more acquisitions of note.

[Survey Open for SCN Top AV Consultants]

First, CTI made its second acquisition in less than a month, acquiring Texolve Digital of Oakmont, PA. Adding Texolve’s team, which provides broadcast engineering and integration at the highest level, will expand the broadcast media division’s ability to serve clients worldwide.

Next, Legrand acquired Girtz Industries, a provider of custom-engineered modular power enclosures and related services based in Monticello, IN. Girtz Industries’ development and integration of complete power systems support the reliable provision of critical power across datacenter, industrial, and commercial applications. It joins Legrand as a business unit within the company’s Electrical Wiring Systems division led by Ravi Ramanathan. David Girtz, who has served as Girtz Industries’ president and CEO for nearly 40 years, will continue to lead the Girtz business and team, reporting to Ravi.

Now, before InfoComm opens its doors, get caught up with the week that was in your regular dose of Pro AV Newsmakers.

People News

AUDIX Welcomes Eric Reese and Sam Vitali

AUDIX appointed Eric Reese to VP and Sam Vitali to the position of director of sales–European markets.

In his new role within the Videndum Creative Solutions family of brands, Reese oversees all functions at AUDIX, including sales, marketing, product development, and operations. He brings over 26 years of extensive experience in the AV and entertainment industry to his new position. Having started his career as a reliability engineer at Peavey Electronics, his background spans the entire product chain—from manufacturing and designing integrated AVL systems to global business development and channel management.

Vitali oversees sales, marketing, and operations within the EMEA region to ensure the brand is optimally represented and supported across Europe. He brings a wealth of experience across sales, marketing, and operations within the music technology industry. He joins AUDIX following a highly successful tenure at Focusrite.

beyerdynamic Names Jesse Dean Managing Directorof the Americas

beyerdynamic has appointed Jesse Dean as managing director of the Americas. In this role, Dean oversees beyerdynamic's business operations, sales strategy, and brand development across North and South America.

Dean brings more than 25 years of experience across the professional audio, video, creator, and consumer technology industries to beyerdynamic. Throughout his career, he has held a range of leadership roles. Most recently, Dean served as director of business development, Americas at RØDE, where he played a key role in the brand’s expansion across the United States.

Brompton Technology appoints Andrew Beaudet as Head of Sales for the Americas

Brompton Technology welcomed Andrew Beaudet as its new head of sales for the Americas. With almost three decades of experience across the music and digital signage industry, Beaudet found his passion for sales running a distributions company with independent manufacturers.

Building on that knowledge, he branched into digital signage where he worked with major LED display manufacturers. By meeting people in the live events industries and observing their work, he developed a keen understanding of what they deserve from large-format LED displays. During his 10 years working with BARCO in its live event and retail division, the camaraderie of the production teams he worked with left a lasting impression. He brings that same respect and understanding to his new role at Brompton.

Grass Valley Appoints Sam Craig as Vice President, Global Pre-Sales

Grass Valley has appointed Sam Craig as VP, global pre-sales. Craig returns to Grass Valley after serving as VP of advisory services at Diversified and previously spent seven years with the company in a number of leadership role.

In his new role, Craig leads Grass Valley’s global pre-sales organization, working closely with regional teams across the Americas, EMEA, and APAC to strengthen collaboration, align customer engagement strategies, and support continued growth across the Grass Valley Media Universe.

PPDS Names Tom Keefe as new Director of Sales for Philips LED in North America

PPDS has welcomed sales professional and Pro AV ‘veteran’, Tom Keefe, as its new director of sales dvLED North America. Keefe's appointment plays an integral role in PPDS continued growth trajectory and long term ambitions in North America, which includes establishing Philips Professional Displays as the preferred partner for premium indoor and outdoor dvLED projects.

An AVIXA CTS holder, he brings extensive market knowledge and 23 years of experience to the PPDS team, with proven expertise in sales, business development, category management, marketing strategy, brand building, distribution, partner relationship management, and market analysis. His core responsibilities include developing and defining PPDS’ organizational sales structure and executing its go-to-market strategy.

Howdy, Partner

Audinate and Soundtrack Technologies Partner to Streamline Business Music with Dante Integration

Soundtrack Techvologies, a music streaming provider for businesses, announced that its hardware solution, the Soundtrack Player, is now compatible with Audinate’s Dante ecosystem. This strategic integration makes it easier than ever for businesses to deploy professional-grade background music across industry-standard Dante networks.

The collaboration bridges the gap between AV networking and commercial music streaming. By enabling Dante directly on the Soundtrack Player, integrators can now route licensed, high-quality music to any Dante-enabled device—including speakers, amplifiers, and processors—via the local network.

Miri Technologies Partners with Midwich For Distribution in North America

Miri Technologies has expanded the global reach and availability of its products with the signing of a new distribution partnership for the United States and Canada with Midwich. The agreement reinforces Miri's channel partnership strategy for meeting the rapidly growing demand for the X510 dual-cellular bonding router and the new V410 4K live encoder/decoder in the world's largest commercial market.

The Miri X510 router enables resilient internet connectivity anywhere by forging multiple wired and wireless links (including Ethernet, Wi-Fi, 4G, 5G and satellite) together to overcome speed limitations and withstand network disruptions even in challenging environments. Powered by Speedify channel bonding technology from Connectify, the X510 bolsters internet connectivity for any type of data and supports use cases ranging from live streaming and remote broadcast contribution to trade shows and disaster response.

WAVIT Announces Recipients of 2026 Mary Cook Empowerment Scholarship

WAVIT (Women in AV/IT) announced the recipients of the 2026 Mary Cook Empowerment Scholarship: Designing the Future. Created in memory of industry pioneer Mary Cook, the scholarship recognizes emerging women leaders in the AV/IT industry who demonstrate passion, leadership potential, and a commitment to advancing their careers in audiovisual technology.

This year marks a significant expansion of the program, with two scholarships awarded for the first time, made possible through the support of sponsoring partner Shure. The scholarship program continues WAVIT’s mission to invest in the next generation of women in AV and honor Mary Cook’s enduring legacy of mentorship, advocacy, and empowerment within the industry.

The 2026 scholarship recipients, Alexa Johnson of IMS Technology Services and Emily Cieslak from TeamPeople, were selected from a highly competitive pool of applicants for their enthusiasm, career ambition, and dedication to shaping the future of AV/IT.

Legrand has acquired Girtz Industries, a provider of custom-engineered modular power enclosures and related services based in Monticello, IN. Girtz Industries’ development and integration of complete power systems support the reliable provision of critical power across datacenter, industrial, and commercial applications.

[Pro AV Newsmakers: A Ricoh Acquisition and Riedel Networks' New CEO]

“The unprecedented demand for power is reshaping our energy landscape," said Brian DiBella, president and CEO, Legrand, North and Central America. "Girtz Industries’ modular power and generator solutions are indispensable to industries that require critical back-up power or off-grid, behind-the-meter primary power options. Legrand is a growth company focused on reaching €15 billion in revenue globally by 2030. To help meet that goal, we continue to acquire businesses that meet global needs, including energy transition and datacenter expansion. Adding Girtz Industries to our portfolio is a natural next step for us. We are extending our reach along the power chain by adding support for power generation and redundancy. This complements our existing portfolio of power quality, power distribution, and cable management solutions, which helps us continually evolve and improve the lives of our customers.”

Girtz Industries joins Legrand as a business unit within the company’s Electrical Wiring Systems division led by Ravi Ramanathan. David Girtz, who has served as Girtz Industries’ president and CEO for nearly 40 years, will continue to lead the Girtz business and team, reporting to Ravi.

“For our hundreds of employees, and for our customers, today is a great day in our impressive journey,” said Girtz. “Since 1963, Girtz Industries has built and maintained a reputation for providing high-quality, reliable products backed by an expertly qualified and reliable team. Our teams take a lot of pride in the fact that precision engineering has always been a mainstay of the Girtz brand. Now, backed by Legrand’s financial strength, Girtz Industries will be able to further invest in our people and facilities within our local community, while also increasing capacity for production and testing services at an accelerated rate. Legrand’s proven expertise in efficiently scaling operations will also help us meet the growing demand from our customers, as well as innovate for more diverse applications.”

AVT Question: Please share insights into your company’s roadmap for products and solutions to be showcased at InfoComm.

Thought Leader: Gauthier Renard, Group Product Manager, Meeting Experience at Barco ClickShare

Microsoft Teams Rooms added much-needed structure, security, and consistency to hybrid meetings. But structure alone does not reflect how meetings actually unfold, with people switching rooms at the last minute, external guests arriving with their own laptops, or a customer sending a meeting link for a different platform. When that happens, even well-equipped rooms can let people down.

For users, the friction is immediate: They walk into a Teams Rooms space, but the meeting is scheduled on another platform; they move rooms unexpectedly and cannot access the new room’s audio and video; or, maybe a guest is ready to present but cannot access the company tenant. The meeting does not fail because of poor planning; it fails because real life doesn’t always play out as planned.

The core challenge is not Microsoft Teams Rooms; it is the gap between a standardized room experience and the variety of meetings people actually join. A space that works perfectly for a scheduled Teams meeting can become harder to use when the meeting link is for another platform, the host is an external guest, or someone needs to run the call from their own laptop. Users fall back on cables, workarounds, or urgent support calls, turning small disruptions into recurring delays.

Adding wireless BYOD within a Teams Rooms environment changes that dynamic, allowing structure and flexibility to coexist. The room remains Teams Rooms ready and aligned with IT requirements, while users can join the call from their laptop when the meeting is hosted on another platform like Zoom, Webex, and Google Meet. External guests can also run meetings confidently while maintaining a consistent in-room experience.

As hybrid work matures, flexibility becomes the real benchmark for meeting room success. Solutions such as ClickShare Hub, with wireless BYOD for Microsoft Teams Rooms, help absorb real-world unpredictability without adding complexity. When users trust that a room will support them no matter how the meeting evolves, meetings become truly reliable spaces for collaboration.

Take a moment to consider all the disruptions we are facing in the broader context of the global economy—changing trade policies through tariffs, supply chain challenges linked to conflict in the Middle East, rising energy costs due to the same, climate change, aging workforces, and of course AI.

The last is perhaps the one that the Pro AV industry is contemplating the most. A quick review of the news coming out of NAB provides a firehose of announcements of the next wave of use cases for AI. In fact, there is a good amount to talk about there, as the exact applications within AV solution sets crystalize. We’ll get to that, but first let’s back up a moment. What exactly is the context?

Optimism or Pessimism?

Coming out of a muted 2025, which saw lower growth rates for GDP and Pro AV specifically, has everyone wondering how 2026 might fare. Starting with GDP, IMF estimates show some challenges, particularly once the Iranian conflict is factored in. Growth rates for the Middle East were cut fairly substantially, creating a ripple effect around the rest of the world.

Estimates now show GDP in 2026 growing 3.1%, down from 3.4% last year. This means a weaker context for Pro AV, as arguably there is less capital to be invested overall, even if technology may win a disproportionate share, as it often does.

The counterpoints to a pessimistic outlook aren’t hard to find. A quick search reveals continued growth in corporate profits, historically low jobless claims, low unemployment rates, and robust consumer spending. Each of those provides a good fundamental for Pro AV investment generally speaking.

Economists continue to talk about an experience economy, in which consumers’ discretionary spending shifts to "micro-luxuries." Witness travel, entertainment, and dining related outlays here. The challenging news is that data shows a slower rate of growth in normalized consumer spending since the peak of the pandemic recovery.

The U.S. World Bank estimates for global household consumption numbers are growing at a slower rate over the past several years and into 2026 once the data is normalized to 2015, rising only 2.7% in 2025. As an early indicator of downstream investment in technology, this could portend softness ahead.

Fortunately, since corporate profits are up, even if consumer spending weakens over the near term, there is room for investment, assuming executives do not also become cautious in light of rising costs. One indicator suggesting the contrary is the Purchase Manager’s Index, a gauge of corporate buying intent. As with any similar diffusion index, scores above 50 indicate growth; the Q1 result shows 52.5, a slight increase from last year.

With consumer spending growth down and corporate plans improving, economists suggest we are entering a late-stage economy wherein growth comes from corporate investments to improve operations and gain efficiencies, instead of one driven by consumers. This is perhaps a good sign for Pro AV, though with many projects being driven more by experiences, this is only partially positive.

Evaluating the Outlooks

With context in mind, let’s turn to the actual outlooks. According to AVIXA, 2025 was a low watermark for growth and 2026 will rebound a bit. Caretta Research shows similar, though with a bit more conservativeness. Both put overall Pro AV spending growth closer to 4%. Based on past differences between GDP and Pro AV, these figures may appear a bit low, but not out of keeping with a general climate of concern. A tepid year of growth, with perhaps an upside more toward 5% is reasonable.

Multi-source data from Q1 helps shed light on the trajectory so far. AVIXA’s AV Business Index, a diffusion index based on surveys submitted by AV professionals, shows a slight uptick in March to near 60. Those paying close attention will immediately notice that March is typically the highwater mark for a given year and should be taken with a grain of salt. Though one month doesn’t make the year, the tone that signal sets is a bit of a cautionary tale. Respondents did indicate rising costs as a chief concern, which echo in other data indicating that the impact of tariffs may be finally showing up in the data.

Turning to the Jetbuilt project management platform for AV dealers and installers offers another signal of a strong start to 2026. The total value of projects created on Jetbuilt increased 38% over the same period last year. While some of this is due to just the increasing usage of the platform, that is well above the baseline growth of 15% in project value for 2025. Thus, it is a clear sign of more projects in the pipeline at a higher value.

Here’s the bigger issue—while the average project values are increasing, the percentage of project costs from hardware is on the rise. While it hovered around 40% over the past few years, it shot up more than 50% in late 2025. This puts pressure on integrators from a margin perspective, as more of the revenue is consumed by hardware rather than markups or service. Once again, we have a potential signal of tariff impacts.

Two examples of the hardware cost increases felt by integrators can be found in data from PMA Research, a market research company focused on the display market. While a bit bouncy, the average prices in the Pro AV channel for both flat-panel displays and projectors have shown 10-20% spikes over the past several months. In the case of FPD and dvLED, this occurred in December with slight improvement since.

Projector prices have risen more steadily both for integrators and at the distributor level with increases more in the 25% range. Given that display prices had been dropping over the past several years due to a surge in inventories, this further supports the theory that inventory has diminished to the point where tariff impacts can be felt.

So where does this leave us as we come together at InfoComm to get a renewed pulse on the evolutions in AI? Here’s what we know: The volume and value of projects in the AV pipeline are showing good growth over last year. But project work may be less profitable for the channel as rising hardware costs eat up the budget. This will further require integrators to be creative in how they gain efficiencies to maintain margin.

Fortunately, AI may be poised to help provide process improvements. AI-powered design recommendation tools coming from project management platforms are emerging to help integrators create and deploy reference designs in a more efficient way.

Get your free copy of SCN's Integration Guide to AVoIP.

Cornhuskers Coverage Conversion

HuskerVision, the in-house production department for University of Nebraska Athletics, has been working in phases to streamline its operations since 2023. Most recently, it deployed an IP-based ST 2110 video infrastructure and opened a centralized production facility to connect three co-located control rooms to multiple venues on campus. Also in this issue, learn how Bally's Baton Rouge is using AVoIP to unify video distribution, audio control, and digital signage.

At Issue

Industry experts from Atlona, DVIGear, Just Add Power, and Matrox Video consider some of the challenges associated with adopting an AVoIP workflow.

Download the Integration Guide to AVoIP.

Read the June issue of Systems Contractor News.

Consider the expectations of your clients officially raised.

The continuing convergence of broadcast and Pro AV technologies means corporate, education, and other verticals want broadcast-quality productions—as do their audiences—coupled with systems that are more user-friendly and a lot less expensive than traditional broadcast studios. So, what technologies are driving the next phase of convergence?

From the integrator's perspective, Ben Dandola-Grubb, VP of technical integration for Verrex, said the next phase of convergence will be driven by technologies that blend high-end AV hardware with software-centric, IP-based workflows. "We’re seeing clients pair advanced cameras and professional audio with IP standards like Dante, NDI, and SRT, while simple tools like OBS and Stream Deck controllers make sophisticated graphics accessible to everyone," he explained. "As these ecosystems mature, the shift toward full AVoIP—eventually including ST 2110 and IMPX—will accelerate even faster."

For Will Waters, principal product manager for Audinate, the most significant driver is a shift toward software-defined media platforms, which can be seen increasingly in universities, enterprises, and media organizations. "Organizations are moving away from fixed, device-centric systems toward environments where routing, processing, and control are implemented in software," he said. "This abstraction allows workflows to be deployed across on-premises infrastructure, virtualized environments, and cloud services using consistent management and security models."

To that end, KVM will also have a part to play in the next chapter of convergence. Anna Kozel, VP of marketing for VuWall | G&D, said technologies like KVM over IP are "enabling operators to access and manage video and data workflows more flexibly across facilities and remote locations. At the same time, centralized management platforms are becoming critical, allowing teams to control video walls, sources, and KVM systems through a single intuitive interface."

Security is also a major driver, Kozel added, particularly in government and enterprise environments where secure remote access, encryption, and compliance with standards like Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) and Common Criteria are essential. "Ultimately, convergence is about operational flexibility, bringing AV, IT, and broadcast workflows together on a shared, scalable infrastructure," she said.

Emphasis on Infrastructure

Sebastian Mucha, MultiDyne's executive VP of sales and strategy, said IPMX is accelerating convergence by “bringing broadcast-grade IP transport into Pro AV without the complexity traditionally associated with ST 2110. This lowers the barrier to entry for high-performance IP systems.”

Distributed workflows—where processing happens closer to the source, rather than centralized control rooms—is another trend. “This aligns with both Pro AV scalability and broadcast remote production models. Plus, cloud is increasingly used for orchestration, monitoring, and workflow management,” Mucha explained.

Jonathan Lyth, product director for enterprise media at Grass Valley, agrees that software-defined production and hybrid cloud will be key drivers. "Instead of tying specific functions to fixed hardware, teams can use the same production capabilities across different events and locations, scaling them up or down as needed," Lyth offered. "This makes it far easier to produce more content without rebuilding systems each time or buying infrastructure to cover occasional peak events."

With software as a driving force, IP networking will (not surprisingly) continue to play a huge role in convergence. "Moving video workflows from the world of baseband into IP is opening new doors, especially as more timing-aware technology surfaces, and high-bandwidth, managed IP equipment becomes easier and more cost-efficient to set up and maintain," said Abe Abt, senior product consultant for AJA Video Systems. "Tools have come down substantially in price, and we’ll continue to see more of this in the years to come."

"As everything moves to an IP infrastructure, the next 'phase' is software-defined workflows all running on COTS servers either on prem, in data centers, or in the public cloud, eliminating bespoke hardware," added Rick Seegull, SVP of technology and business development for Riedel Communications. "These innovations will promote true interoperability between vendors’ software within the broadcast, Pro AV, and IT systems, having all software access the media directly in memory and enabling seamless communication across multi-vendor environments. By supporting open standards and flexible architectures, they allow customers to select best-of-breed components while building scalable, future-ready workflows."

A Place for AI

AI will play a role, Lyth acknowledged, but he said its early impact will be largely focused on reducing day-to-day workloads, rather than changing how Pro AV content is created. "Tasks like system monitoring, tagging content, preparing clips, and checking quality control can increasingly be automated, helping teams to deliver more frequent productions more reliably, making live production easier to repeat and manage at scale," he said.

According to Abt, some live sports networks are already using AI to quickly produce highlight reels for distribution on social media platforms. "AI is another emerging technology that both industries are just beginning to explore, and it's already showing a lot of promise for enhancing media asset management and the setup and configuration of live productions," he added.

While Waters said AI and automation will support monitoring, diagnostics, provisioning, and content management, their value depends on a strong foundation of software and management. "For decision-makers, convergence means applying IT and platform thinking to media operations. Prioritizing vendors that offer flexible deployment models, open APIs, and systems proven at scale helps create ecosystems that balance usability, control, and long-term sustainability," he said.

Michael Bergeron, Panasonic's senior category manager–advanced video production technology, believes the challenge with technologies such as cloud or AI is determining where each has its maximum benefit. "We tried cloud everywhere in the early 2020s," he recalled, "and it stuck in places where scalability was required or where rarely used assets needed to be delivered—cases in which on-prem support of the same functionality might be cost prohibitive. We may see a similar shakedown with AI. GenAI content is still too easily recognized as such, but AI with a human operator is a force multiplier."

AVT Question: Please share insights into your company’s roadmap for products and solutions to be showcased at InfoComm.

Thought Leader: Duncan Miller, Director of Global Marketing at Adder Technology

At InfoComm, we're showcasing more than products and solutions; we're demonstrating how Adder is helping organizations simplify and unify control across complex AV and IT environments.

Adder is driven by a clear philosophy: deliver complete connectivity, exceptional user experiences, and the flexibility customers need to scale and evolve their operations with confidence. As AV and IT infrastructures continue to converge, organizations are looking for solutions that are secure, intuitive, and easily integrated into broader workflows.

A key focus for us has been expanding the openness of our platforms. Through enhanced API capabilities across our portfolio, we're enabling administrators, developers, and technology partners to integrate Adder solutions more deeply into control systems, management platforms, and automated workflows. As organizations look to connect AV, IT, and operational technologies more seamlessly, our APIs provide the flexibility to build tailored workflows that improve efficiency, visibility, and control.

This commitment to interoperability continues with the launch of the ARDx™ Software Development Kit (SDK), which allows third parties to embed high-performance, out-of-band KVM-over-IP capabilities directly into their own applications. Together, our APIs and SDK provide customers and partners with greater freedom to integrate Adder’s technology into the ecosystems that best meet their needs.

We’re also introducing AIM 6, the latest generation of our ADDERLink INFINITY system management software. Developed in response to customer feedback, AIM 6 introduces a redesigned user interface, enhanced accessibility, greater system visibility, and strengthened security features, helping administrators and operators manage increasingly sophisticated IP KVM deployments more efficiently.

Visit Adder at InfoComm 2026 on booth #C5449 to see AIM 6, ARDx, and our range of IP KVM solutions.

CTI has acquired Texolve Digital of Oakmont, PA. Adding Texolve’s team, which provides broadcast engineering and integration at the highest level, will expand the broadcast media division’s ability to serve clients worldwide. It is CTI's second acquisition in less than a month, after acquiring Valley Communications Systems on May 19.

“I don’t think there’s another broadcast engineering and integration company in the U.S. that provides broadcast solutions for all the major league sports in their city," said John Laughlin, CEO of CTI. "It’s incredible: Texolve works with the [Pittsburgh] Penguins at Acrisure Stadium, the Steelers at PPG Paints Arena, and the Pirates at PNC Park. I can’t tell you how excited I am to bring this team into CTI’s broadcast division.

“Their focus on problem-solving and client satisfaction makes them a strong fit for the culture here at CTI. I can’t wait to see what they can do as part of our growing broadcast division, which already counts the NYSE, the Houston Rockets, the University of Michigan, and the Philadelphia Union among its clients.”

CTI's Whirlwind of Acquisitions

CTI has been one of the busiest Pro AV companies dating back to February 2024. CTI first acquired Vistacom of Allentown, PA, that month and a mere three months later, CTI acquired not one, but two companies, first, Advanced Systems Integration (ASI) to expand its Pro AV services to Minneapolis, and then San Antonio-based Digital Technology Solutions.

That momentum continued into 2025, when CTI acquired its 39th U.S. location in Delta AV, providing expanded coverage of the Pacific Northwest to Portland Metro Area. CTI also used 2025 to expand its West Coast operations with the acquisition of LightWerks and then extended its global reach with the acquisition of Candeo Vision of London in the U.K. This year already, CTI has made four acquisitions with this move following May's acquisition, which came on the heels of its April acquisition of Nomad AV Systems after the late March acquisition of Streamline Solutions, expanding its reach to Seattle.

For decades, innovation in the AV and collaboration industry has largely followed a familiar path.

Manufacturers build products. Consultants and integrators assemble those products into systems. End users compare and evaluate the proposed solutions, and eventually deploy what the market has made available.

Over time, that model has arguably become even more linear. As enterprise collaboration scaled, the industry moved further toward standardization, repeatability, and solutions designed for the “average user” and the “typical” room. That shift had good reasons behind it.

Standardization helped the industry scale. But it also made it easier to forget how differently real people and real organizations actually work.

More and more, the opportunity to contribute innovation value moved away from the many and into the hands of the largest and most resourced players, where scale and efficiency were greatest. And I’d propose that it is both a problem and an opportunity as we move further into an AI age of change and uncertainty.

I have never sat in the chair of an end-user technology manager, but I have spent much of my career pushing back against the status quo in how our industry operates and builds business models that serve more than the transaction itself. From that vantage point, I believe one thing very strongly in this moment: the end user community has more power to shape the future of collaboration than it exercises today.

The entire industry is hungry for direction. Manufacturers are trying to understand where AI-enabled value will actually land. Integrators are trying to determine how their role evolves. Consultants are trying to rethink what guidance looks like when best practice itself is changing. Everyone is trying to see around the corner of transformative shifts that may only be 12 to 24 months away in a legacy that operates on five-plus-year lifecycles.

Of course, that makes the role of a collaboration technology leader incredibly difficult. As the future of work, collaboration, and workplace experience becomes more intelligent, adaptive, and critical to organizational success, collaboration technology leaders cannot simply wait for the supply chain to bring them tomorrow’s answers.

They need help, but more importantly, they also need to help shape the answers. In this unprecedented environment, particularly where AI is shifting many elements of best practice back from ‘standardization’ and toward hyper-personalization, customer clarity can become a true force for innovation.

But my argument for deeper end-user engagement and leadership goes beyond specific problem-solving. Across the end-user community, there are organizations whose entire market position is built on the foundation of their capacity for transformative innovation. They have world-class research and development capabilities, defined digital transformation teams, data scientists, formal AI programs, innovation infrastructure, and cultures built around a mandate to fail fast, learn quickly, and move forward with intent.

And yet, too often, that innovation muscle is applied outward to the products, services, and markets the organization serves, while rarely being applied with the same intent to the internal operational ecosystems that power the organization. And as we well know, that very much applies to their collaboration infrastructure. Not only do we spend too little time fully understanding the needs and workflows of these collaboration power users to serve them, but we also fail to leverage the opportunity to learn from the innovation capabilities and best practices they maintain.

That matters because we, as the collaborative enablement industry, need those skills. From vendor to integrator to technology manager, innovation is not deeply embedded in our DNA. If we are going to remain relevant in the AI era, we need to learn, understand, and apply innovation far more deliberately.

Deliberate Innovation

So, I ask you to imagine an enterprise collaboration leader proactively convening three groups.

A combination of internal modern workplace stakeholders: real estate, HR, IT, AI, security, procurement, learning, workplace strategy, and others, with organizational context, technical imagination, and human workforce insight.

The most progressive external partners from across the supply chain: mainstream vendors with scale, emerging vendors with agility, integrators with delivery knowledge, consultants with strategic perspective, and service partners with operational understanding.

A selection of the organization’s own innovation leaders, both as catalysts for innovation itself and as users with lived experience of what is broken, missing, or possible in their own collaboration workflows.

Not for a one-off workshop. But as contributors to an ongoing strategy, structure, and process of ideation, experimentation, validation, and iteration. A group that could explore critical questions, such as whether AI has created new opportunities to:

>> Allow collaboration spaces to adapt more intelligently to equip different meeting types?

>> Offer utilization data, employee experience signals, and business workflows that could be interpreted together to build entirely new operational models?

>> Enable support models that become predictive and proactive rather than reactive?

>> Reduce many of the frictions and effort we currently face before, during, and after people come together?

This is where the process of innovation becomes less like procurement and more like chemistry. The point is to create an environment to “play” with different technology and human ingredients. To discover catalytic combinations that, when brought together, might release transformational new energy into the collaboration process.

Of course, just as in chemistry, not every combination will create a useful reaction. Most will fail—that’s the nature of innovative explorations. But occasionally, that experimentation will create something far more valuable than the sum of its parts. It may even become the foundation for a whole new line of exploration and opportunity that serves every participant well beyond the original initiative.

The Broader Collaboration Ecosystem

The challenge, of course, is that this is not an insignificant undertaking.

There are models that point in this direction. Microsoft’s Hive is one well-known example. So, there is precedent and business case. But examples like this remain too rare across the broader collaboration ecosystem.

In my recent conversations across the end user community, very few reject the value or need for this kind of approach. Their hesitation is rarely because the concept lacks merit. More so, it is because of everything that would need to change internally to make it viable.

Undoubtedly, this type of innovation model requires the supply chain to evolve. But frankly, we all know most manufacturers, integrators, and consultants would jump at the opportunity to support a serious initiative like this with their best customers if a true win-win partnership is on the table.

The AV and UC supply chain has for years sought to offer more service-centric models, risk-sharing models, managed lifecycle approaches, and outcome-based relationships. We know AI now makes many of those models far more viable than ever. Some past efforts absolutely fell short because the offerings were immature. But many also struggled because customers were simply not ready or equipped to buy, fund, govern, or evaluate them differently.

That is why I would argue the first work starts with the internal foundations on the customer side. Procurement approaches. Capital planning models. Security review processes. Real estate strategies. Support expectations. Sustainability priorities. Risk tolerances. Departmental silos.

So, if we believe that collaboration powers innovation and innovation creates competitive advantage, in a world where the rate of change in markets has never been faster, and amid all the other priorities the AI era is creating, is enhanced innovation capability seen at senior executive level as a distraction, or as an imperative?

That matters because that executive sponsorship is where the silos driving the lack of confidence in the models I describe can be overcome.

It’s here that the leadership opportunity begins! Building consensus, finding advocates, identifying the internal and external thought leadership to create momentum, connecting collaboration enablement to the bigger organizational priorities already on the table.

None of that is easy. But what is new is that there may never have been a stronger story to tell, or a moment of greater willingness across organizations to listen to progressive ideas for change. This is a moment of leadership opportunity and strategic relevance that many in this industry have been seeking for their entire careers.

So the practical challenge I put to the end user community is this: in moments of uncertainty, the party that controls demand has more power to lead than it often recognizes. You have an opportunity to build a plan, articulate a vision, and start designing the conditions and initial steps required to drive the experimental collaborations that will underpin the future of your career, of this industry, and of your organization.

I do not pretend there is a single recipe or destination for this shift. Each organization will have different risk profiles, cultures, governance models, and collaboration patterns. But the message is clear.

For leaders within organizations where innovation, change, and human collaboration are central to future success - do not wait for the market to define your future. Let’s find the ways to invite the right people into the room, bring the real challenges and opportunities to the table, and create the conditions for better answers to emerge.

In the AI era, the most valuable end user collaboration leaders may not be those who simply buy the best technology, but those who become the best collaborators in shaping what that technology, and the human and digital innovation ecosystem around it, need to become.

For an industry still learning how to innovate, let alone at the speed of AI, that kind of customer leadership may be exactly the catalyst we collectively need.

First, I would like to define the workplace. It is wherever you work. That could be in a corporate environment, a home office, a classroom, an auditorium, a sports venue, a museum, a government office, a transportation facility, a control room, a healthcare environment, hospitality, on the road, or in the field—you name it.

Hopefully, your environment is controlled with the optimal acoustics for speech intelligibility (near and far) and has the ideal lighting so the images on displays are clear. Yes, I know that’s a bold statement, but this is our industry, and if we want our collaboration spaces to enable positive outcomes and enhance productivity, it’s something to continuously work towards.

There’s no doubt that collaboration in the workplace has dramatically changed in the past few years. But this is no longer a conversation about the percentage of employees who are hybrid or remote, or how many days they work in the “office.” Remote participants could be vendors or invited speakers. Collaboration also means sharing content so everyone in the room can clearly view it on the displays, hear all participants, and share ideas.

Collaboration and The AI Factor

Artificial intelligence is a massive topic. It’s akin to talking about the impact of the World Wide Web in the late '80s and '90s, only bigger and more unknown.

At AV Technology, we’re going to home in on the potential and ever-evolving impact AI can have on collaboration in the workplace. My goal is to share ideas, inspire, educate, and sometimes challenge conventional thinking.

We’re launching the AV Technology Thought Leader Series on Collaboration and AI with Byron Tarry. He is the founder and chief transformation officer of NΞXXT, which helps individuals and organizations build collaboration-centric transformation that is measurable, responsible, and built to last. Tarry has more than 30 years in the AV and collaboration technologies realm, including nearly a decade as CEO of global AV integrator GPA. He brings a rare combination of strategic perspective and hands-on understanding of what makes innovation and change stick at scale. He will regularly contribute thought leadership articles for us. And, having spent some time with him, I am sure he will get you thinking outside the box.

Tarry is a frequent speaker on AI and collaboration and will be presenting The SPRINT at InfoComm, a hands-on innovation experience designed to help the AV and collaboration industry learn how to turn AI opportunities into practical outcomes. We connected at Integrated Systems Europe, where he presented on the topic of AI. I invited him to deliver our keynote at the AV/IT Summit in New York City on Aug. 5, The AI Moment for the Collaborative Workplace.

We’re thrilled to welcome Tarry into our circle of trusted contributors.

AVT Question: Please share insights into your company’s roadmap for products and solutions to be showcased at InfoComm.

Thought Leader: Mark Bonifacio, Director, Business Management, Professional Display Solutions, Sony Electronics

At InfoComm 2026, Sony Electronics is positioning its expansive professional AV portfolio around a clear idea: empowering creativity while enhancing spaces. Our booth features displays, dvLED, projection, PTZ cameras, management tools, and partner integrations in real-world environments spanning corporate, education, command and control, retail, broadcast, digital signage, and virtual production, as well as interactive experiences and demos. As the industry transitions from standalone AV hardware toward integrated experiences, Sony is highlighting an ecosystem of solutions and alignments that facilitate communication, connectivity, learning, and engagement while making installations more intelligent, efficient, and adaptable.

Visitors will see new BRAVIA Professional BZ-P Series displays, comprised of 16 models that combine AI-powered XR processing, Deep Black Non-Glare technology, and improved energy efficiency. We’re also expanding our Crystal LED family to prioritize installation speed and accessibility. The S Series targets mid-market environments, and UNIFY provides an All-in-One entry to the portfolio, while CAPRI combines high brightness and anti-reflection, bringing virtual production capabilities to a wider audience.

Sony is also advancing automation and content capture through additions and strategic updates to its PTZ camera portfolio. The compact SRG-AS10 and SRG-XS10 deliver 4K 60p, low-light performance, flexible installation, and broad protocol support. The SRG-AS10 adds AI Auto Framing, including multi-person and basketball tracking, while firmware updates to the SRG-A40/A12 extend AI sports, stabilization, overlay, and facial recognition capabilities.

Complementary and open solutions are also a central focus for Sony. Zero Touch Provisioning, cloud-based device tools, device management, open control support, and mobile access reduce integration friction and simplify operations. At InfoComm, Sony is not simply launching products; it is presenting a connected AV philosophy built around interoperability, sustainability, automation, and practical problem-solving for spaces that work harder, look better, and evolve faster.

AVT Question: Please share insights into your company’s roadmap for products and solutions to be showcased at InfoComm.

Thought Leader: Kendra Philips, senior vice president af sales at Legrand | AV

At Legrand | AV, our philosophy is straightforward: customers don’t buy products, they buy outcomes. That belief shapes every conversation we have with integrators, end users, and consultants, and it’s the throughline of our InfoComm 2026 presence under the theme “Where Solutions Live.”

This year, we’re showcasing how our brands work together to solve vertical-specific challenges. In corporate, higher education, government, and commercial retail, the questions aren’t about a single mount, a single switcher, or a single rack. They’re about how the entire AV system performs over its lifecycle. Our roadmap reflects that reality.

Three solutions illustrate where we’re heading. Our new Unified Cloud Platform brings AI-driven remote monitoring and management to the AV stack, giving integrators visibility, predictive insight, and recurring managed service revenue opportunities that didn’t exist before. The new Vaddio SpeakerVIEW redefines automated conferencing, intelligently tracking active speakers without the operator overhead that has historically limited adoption. And Chief continues to push display mounting forward with engineering built for today’s installations, from in-wall and portrait Tempo applications to TiLED trim solutions for dvLED applications.

What ties these together isn’t a feature list. It’s a commitment to building product families that meet integrators where they work and customers where they live. Our roadmap will continue to prioritize interoperability, serviceability, and the kind of design integrity that makes specifying a Legrand | AV solution the right choice years after installation.

We know, InfoComm prep is in full force. You may have missed some of the big news last week, but fear not. SCN and AV Network has you covered with our weekly check in on Pro AV's biggest newsmakers.

Before we get to that, June opened with Other World Computing (OWC) acquiring PowerON Services, known for its IT asset disposition (ITAD), trade-in, reverse logistics, refurbishment, and technology value recovery solutions. The PowerOn acquisition is an ideal enhancement to OWC’s SellYourMac.com (SYM), a purchaser and reseller of used Apple computers, iPhones, and iPads. Want to know more? Click here.

That was followed by an acquisition by SCN Top 50 Systems Integrator, Ricoh. Ricoh Company and Ricoh Asia Pacific acquired Global Vision Multimedia Group, a specialized provider of audiovisual and multimedia integration services with expertise across the Asia-Pacific region. The acquisition accelerates Ricoh's expansion of its workplace services portfolio and service delivery footprint in the region.

Founded in 2016, Global Vision Multimedia brings end-to-end services spanning design, integration, and ongoing support for AV and multimedia solutions and over 140 experts across the region. Global Vision Multimedia serves multinational corporations and regional enterprises across multiple industry sectors, supported by deep local expertise and the ability to centrally manage complex, multi-country projects, ensuring consistent, high-quality service delivery across the region.

By integrating Global Vision Multimedia's strong regional track record and complementary capabilities with Ricoh's global workplace services portfolio, Ricoh further strengthens its position as a global integrator, meeting the needs, challenges and ambitions of customers across the Asia-Pacific region.

Now, on with the show.

People News

ASG Promotes Joe Marchitto to Western Regional CTO

Advanced Systems Group (ASG) has promoted Joe Marchitto to Western Regional CTO. In this new leadership role, Marchitto’s is working on advancing tools, workflows, and engineering alignment across the organization.

Marchitto will oversees the management and evolution of ASG’s system design across both pre and post-sales functions to streamline project execution, deepen engineering engagement, and deliver a more seamless and responsive client experience. He works closely with ASG professional services manager Rob Wentz to align team objectives for the upcoming year, while continuing to support pre-sales engineering on the West Coast.

He previously served as CTO-strategic accounts, where he provided pre-sales engineering support for enterprise clients across the West Coast. Marchitto became a trusted advisor to customers, navigating complex technical environments and helping design solutions that balanced performance, scalability, and cost.

CODA Audio USA Appoints Mark Meding

CODA Audio appointed Mark Meding as managing director of CODA Audio USA. In this role, Meding leads the company’s continued strategic expansion across North America, with a focus on further strengthening market presence, developing channel partnerships, and driving sustainable revenue growth.

With more than 30 years of experience in the professional audio and AV industry, Meding brings a proven track record spanning business ownership, sales management, product management, and business development. Throughout his career, he has built strong relationships across manufacturers, integrators, consultants, and distribution partners, perfectly positioning him to accelerate CODA Audio’s growth in the region.

Live Technology Appoints Curtis Lewis

Live Technology, supplier to the audio, lighting, and video markets, appointed Curtis Lewis to the position of lighting sales manager. Lewis represents Live Technology’s extensive lighting portfolio, with a focus on supporting and supplying new and existing customers, including maintaining and developing close relationships with lighting designers.

With 25 years experience in lighting sales, Lewis brings a proven track record of success to Live Technology. While dealing across the board with all of Live Technology’s distributed lighting brands (Elation, Obsidian, Robert Juliat, Stage Smarts, Martin, and JEM) he takes the lead for the company on Elation products, with a view to accelerating the brand’s growth in the UK market.

Gudrun Scharler Appointed CEO of Riedel Networks

The Riedel Group today announced the appointment of Gudrun Scharler as CEO of Riedel Networks. She succeeds Michael Martens, who has led Riedel Networks since 2012 and will support a structured handover through the end of August.

Scharler brings extensive executive experience from leading telecommunications and technology companies, where she has improved operational performance, led customer-focused transformation, and managed complex organizations. Her track record includes key roles at Unitymedia, where she served as chief operations officer, as well as senior leadership positions at Nets Group, E-Plus, Sunrise Communications, and Telefónica Germany. Most recently, she expanded her leadership experience through roles at Canyon Bicycles and P2 eBike GmbH.

Company News

Mason Technologies Breaks Ground on New HQ

Mason Technologies broke ground in May for its future corporate headquarters in the Long Island Innovation Park at Hauppauge, NY. The groundbreaking ceremony brought together business leaders, industry organizations, and government officials from across Long Island to celebrate the company’s continued success and investment in the region.

Its new HQ will be a 69,000-square-foot building with a 2,800 square-foot atrium and a dedicated exhibition and event space intended for networking, collaboration, and technology demonstrations.

The company’s mission has always been to work with individuals and organizations who help change the world, primarily in healthcare spaces, higher education, and government projects. Founded in 2002 by CEO Jennifer Mason with just two employees, Mason Technologies now has locations in four states and 275 W-2 employees, with plans for continued growth as construction moves forward on the new facility.