what's the next big thing what's the
next big thing what's the next big thing
what's the next big thing higher
technology the next Wow the next OMG the
next seriously I don't know I don't know
I don't know Cena knows find out at the
next big thing
welcome to the consumer electronic show
welcome to cnet's next big thing super
session well it was really good yeah is
it knows all right well that it's the
biggest trade show in the world this is
more than 120,000 people in Las Vegas
for this event and for you-know-who
cousin blow awesome hmm the first
previews of the new technology will be
available to you today the highlights
over the years that have been here the
VCR the camcorder the dvds the HD TVs
tablets the hill the abacus yeah the
abacus was originally introduced at this
event over 5,000 years ago that's true
and it wound him on the floor dead it
wired them on the floor everyone in
Vegas was like much as they are now
everyone's very excited this year about
the 3d TV the new xbox system and now
please welcome our hosts from cnet
Mollywood that's a real name Hollywood
that's a greenie yeah it's like Molly
Molly would but it's Molly woods three
Marley Marley would I bet she's never
had that before Evelina no no Molly wait
and then Brian Cooley to him Bollywood
and Brian Cooley everybody
everyone got our cnet stage later for
the unedited version you want to see the
objects that's the next big thing
welcome to Xena presents the next big
thing it's our annual CES super session
where the cnet team lays out the hottest
trend and consumer electronics
technology these are about technologies
and trends and layers of both of them
that are going to define consumer
electronics and media and advertising
for many years ahead and in this case
this year the next big thing is the
ecosystem and I am fairly certain that
if you've been here longer than a few
hours you've heard that term at least
100,000 times which means we feel pretty
good about this decision we're talking
about that essential essential
connection between the actual consumer
electronics the hardware that you see
all over this show floor the content on
it whether it's books or video or
television or games the apps the
operating system and the connectivity
and the ecosystem is this dream that in
some ways all combines to get us closer
to the vision of the always on always
connected do-it-all device right how
long have you been heading toward that
one those devices alone just don't cut
it anymore that's the big story here the
Consumer Electronics Show is very much
about electronics but now we can get
those devices to sort of leave the
ground a little bit to transcend where
they come from as tangible devices and
today we're going to try and figure out
this ecosystem era by talking to some
key players one-on-one with some of the
biggest names in technology really none
of which will need introduction for you
and what this trend and what this era
going forward very deeply means for
consumers established companies and also
upstarts that are on the make please
join the conversation by tweeting your
thoughts about this panel let everybody
know that you're here as we dive a
little bit deeper and explore at least
how we see this concept of the ecosystem
we're gigabytes of RAM terabyte hard
drug 4.3 inch to HD touchscreen 8
gigabytes of flash memory consumer
electronics used to be almost solely
about the electronics but that's
changing fast after months of rumors
Facebook's new app for the iPad now the
sinking of media content is the slickest
part there's the line between what's on
the device and what's in the cloud and
it integrates with your gmail and your
android now specs are basically the
price of admission and winners are built
on the shoulders of what you can't touch
their ecosystem that refers to the
combination of device services apps
content and operating system when
consumers buy a device today they're
really buying into a way of using it
smartphones and tablets that are
gateways to media games social networks
video chat and more TV sets set-top
boxes and blu-ray players that talk to
the cloud your mobile devices and each
other it's media that is in place and in
sync wherever you go whatever you're
using but when consumers buy into an
ecosystem they're investing in much more
than just a device and a few apps to put
on it hardware operating system apps
content and provider form a complicated
matrix consumers first need to be able
to understand it then decide which one
they'll use if one Apple arguably
started the modern ecosystem trend with
iPhone or iPad that makes you part of
iTunes and App Store and now I cloud
amazon built a media empire first then
devices on its shoulders most recently
the kindle fire microsoft has all the
pieces led by xbox but so far struggles
to put them all together and
traditionally hardware centric makers
like samsung must figure out how to
create ecosystems out of collections of
services and partners and surface those
to consumers
then of course there's Google the
company that has created an ecosystem
that is closest in weight to the Apple
juggernaut but distributed across many
makers devices and interface
interpretations yet keeping Google
services and software at the center of
this Federation of experience but before
any of us can pick a winning company we
must first spot winning strategies how
to do that is why we're here today
ladies and gentlemen please welcome
Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt
thank you thank you so much for joining
us today it seems only appropriate now
that we've given our long vision of what
we think of as the ecosystem for you to
I guess tell us what ecosystem means to
Google well hopefully it means scalable
network platforms that really provide
tremendous customer value it's funny
that I would say the same thing by
saying when I look at my in this case
android phone I don't see one phone I
see a supercomputer of at least a
million computers that are out there in
the cloud some we are connected by very
high speed networks tremendous amount of
content and algorithms which are
conveniently accessible to me on my 4
inch device so when you talk about
devices I think in traditional language
really are missing the fact that these
are simply portals for to use an old
word into literally all the world's
information right that hardware is
nothing without software or in this case
services and information and what's
happened of course now is that all
hardware strategies involve some kind of
a software strategy and vice versa I
think in the Android case we were
particularly fortunate that we were able
to make the Android operating system
free and so harder manufacturers could
sort of buy-in at essentially the right
price which is zero and get something is
dysfunctional and of course there's
value from having everybody in the same
ecosystem that seems to us to be the sea
change though this idea that the
standalone device is maybe even less
useful than it ever was without those
contents are to be powered by a well but
computers that are but computing devices
that are not on a network are lonely
right I mean it makes no sense to have
anything now that's not on some sort of
Wi-Fi net one of the more shocking
things is that Wi-Fi now is used to
control all the lights in your house you
know nobody designed Wi-Fi for that
there remember there were all these
specialized networks and so forth and so
on but in fact there's a new generation
of devices which are being premiere here
at CES which just get under your Wi-Fi
network they talk to the other devices
and off they go right so is it just
about being networked to you as a crop
because you've talked obviously the
smartphone is maybe the center of it all
probably but we do seem to see a
universe in which all devices speak to
each other maybe more than they ever
have and
android seems to power an awful lot of
those devices well that's of course our
goal but our real strategy is actually
somewhat different from that we want to
sort of move from talking about devices
which everybody loves to talk about two
rather talking about how it solves
problems what you really want to be able
to do is walk in your house and have as
you arrive in your house with your
Android device all of the things that
have computers in it sort of adjust as
necessary and so when you go into the
family room the television knows it's
you because your android device
authenticates you as opposed to the
other family members a text message
comes to you and it goes to the
television because that's your
preference or not right and it all sinks
together and all of the previous sort of
discussions about this have assumed some
uber home server some central master
that would watch in what was going on in
the house all the different devices but
in fact that's completely wrong the
right model is to think of these as
peer-to-peer devices that talk to each
other and they understand roughly what
their function is and what people want
they can be configured and mopped in way
obviously it becomes seamless the trick
to consumer products is to make them
work right it is remarkable to me that
we've spent and I've been coming here
for 20 years building products that
aren't very good right that the products
the require enormous amount of technical
knowledge to keep them running right so
we've now seen in the last few years
where the number of vendors Google
obviously being one where the product is
so simple it just works and underlying
that simplicity is extraordinarily
difficult and expensive engineering
which is what's happening in these large
platform companies that you see so as
Android your vehicle for getting to that
end product or you know is it your goal
to we've seen Android TVs announced
you're obviously tablets obviously
smartphones is it your goal to have
Android in refrigerators to reach you
know to is that my vehicle for Google to
get there well you know refrigerators do
need some automation right if you think
about it they need to actually deal with
in their energy costs there's a lot of
surveys about getting your energy bills
down and so forth and indeed there are
companies that are putting android and
refrigerators so there now are these
because you are these because they're
brilliant and they've done a full
evaluation of all their choices or did
they simply choose r android because it
was free you know you never know and one
of the key things about the android
form and our licenses is often these are
things that we don't know until they get
announced and so when we say open source
we mean take it and have a good time and
that's I think one of the sort of core
strategies which differentiates us from
the other vendors to that end actually
much in a different fashion from apple
or even Microsoft think let's talk about
let's start with smartphones the
carriers the manufacturers have a great
deal of influence over android is that a
positive do you think all the time you
know there's always a balance between
what the carrier wants what the consumer
wants what the vendor wants what the
advertiser wants and so forth and so on
we've taken the position that you can
take the Android operating system and
you can do whatever you want to with it
if you want to use our certification you
have to essentially be conforming to the
principles of the android market and our
reasoning which I think ultimately you
know I wish people had invented this
many years ago I think the first company
to really do this is that what people
really care about using in your language
is that there's an interoperable
operative and interoperable ecosystem of
applications there's more than 300,000
remember when when Apple was busy
talking about they had this many this
many this many well now we have more
than 300,000 applications on top of the
Android ecosystem so they're a scalable
model really means that you could start
building these things quickly and it
benefits the whole to have an
application that runs on every device I
asked our users what they were
interested in hearing from you to that
point and the the single most common
question especially on Google+ was
whether you would ever offer a stock
vanilla option for every Android phone
maybe a second wrong that users could is
so that fragmentation does appear to be
low be hampering you want to be careful
with the word fragmentation okay when I
use the word fragmentation of
differentiation differentiation is
different from fragmentation
differentiation is positive
fragmentation is negative differentiate
appreciation for they give the room
differentiation means that you have a
choice and the people who are making and
let's use phones as an example we're
making phones they're going to compete
based on their view of innovation and
they're going to try to convince you
that there's is better than somebody
else fragmentation means that you have
some application that you care about it
it only runs on one and not the other
and you only
I have a choice is it important
important subtle there but isn't some of
that happening to stomach it's not
what's happening is our core strategy is
to get everybody under the ice ice cream
sandwich which is the new release which
is on this phone and we we absolutely
allow as part of our normal business are
our partners to add or change the user
interfaces and so forth as long as they
don't brake application compatibility we
see this as a plus it's an area for a
differentiation they can adapt their
software to the necessary hardware
changes that they want and it's given
you far far more choices than any other
strategy we could've imagined do you
think that ice cream sandwich is an
opportunity for maybe a little greater
control or do you feel like that's not
necessary well do at least over the
skinny when you say add implantation
when you say control it's absolutely a
an opportunity to standardize the api's
and the basic level of services that
android phones offer it is not a
requirement that one use exactly the
same user interfaces and so forth
although we certainly hope everybody
will use the standard user interface
people are free to make the necessary
changes as they see that and what's
great about it is if you don't like it
you don't have to buy that phone you can
buy from somebody else you actually have
a choice competition provides value
drives across town etc Sarah let's talk
about the living room a little bit that
seems to be a bigger and bigger part of
the ecosystem certainly relevant to this
show here how do you get there and we've
seen now Google TV a bigger part of LG's
lineup this year also Android on TV do
is their crossover is you know as
Android the road how do you get in the
living room well of course Google TV is
doing very well we LG just announced
samsung has announced that they're
working on some stuff we have a whole
bunch of additional partners coming we
release Google TV in roughly September
it's the only only offering I know of
that fully integrates the television
experience and the browsing experience
all the ones that have been w previously
have had limitations this is a full
function browser a full function
platform for combining internet
capabilities internet viewing as well as
traditional television doing we've
argued quite strongly that people will
watch more television because of google
television because they don't need to go
somewhere else
they don't have to go to their other
screen it's all there they can go back
and forth and integrate and cross
integrate them Google TV is an example
of the pointers making earlier which is
that the more and more of the devices
that you have in the home the more they
can talk to each other to configure
around your needs to if your TV is
running Android your phone is running
Android they can talk to each other how
important is content in that scenario
well of course content is what drives
everything we've been fortunate that
we've now and I think it took quite a
cook us a long time to complete the
necessary pieces we needed we were able
to launch a couple months ago Google
music if you haven't tried it I
encourage you to do it three of the four
major labels more than a thousand of the
independent labels all there's lots and
lots of music and a partnership that you
can purchase there there's also a
mechanism for people who are truly
independent it won't want to be labels
themselves to publish their information
into the ecosystem it's available all
the new on all the new android devices
we had previously done books and movies
I think we have a full offering now so
you obviously have a long list of
products how important is integration we
have a lot of user saying can I get a
dashboard a unified dashboard for G+ for
Gmail for report but also true
convergence between gtalk and voice and
this has been Larry you know larious CEO
decided to much much more focus on on
solving this problem than I did and
since essentially April or May has been
leading an internal effort to completely
standardized standardized both the UI
and the expression across this for
precisely the reason the direct
historically google has been a set of
not fiefdom but sort of reasonably
independent units of creativity it
served us very well but it drew drove
this slightly different feeling to
everything and we made a decision to
cross integrate it so from the consumer
perspective how much of a concern is
lock in media lock in to some extent if
you buy in fact there was an apple legal
representative quoted in court in
Australia saying that the Galaxy Tab vs
ipad lawsuit was primarily about
ecosystem that it was about you know
they didn't want to create android
customers who would buy a bunch of media
that wouldn't work on an iPad this
convoluted I know that this reasoning is
only the reasoning that a lawyer who was
paid for by app
could have come up with apple apple eyes
a bunch of stuff Apple work very hard to
block choice in Germany by trying to
prevent Samsung tablets to becoming
available right right that's called
prevention of choice consumers should
want choices I don't mind if you
actually prefer the other guys product
I'd like you to evaluate mine fairly and
make an appropriate decision as a
consumer it's called competition right
well and you the media that you sell is
primarily open formats right that can be
transferred to other devices that I
think is that where customers worry
about lock and do they have to buy all
Samsung forever well with it for
everything to work well certainly with
android android platform is media
interoperable and so all the products
that i was talking about the movies and
the music and so forth work on non
samsung as well as samsung devices and
that's part of the promise if you're
asking what does a consumer think about
media log and a consumer is pretty
straightforward it's pretty well
understood they want to be able to
purchase and i hope legally copyrighted
information they want to be able to
repurpose it on every device in their
home in their office without any hassle
and why it's so hard for all of us to
understand that is beyond me and a lot
of them are unwilling to do things which
are illegal various forms of copying and
so forth because they're prevented
legally to pay for it you'll be much
better much better for the industries as
a whole to organize themselves to allow
that to occur and to get an appropriate
fee for doing so alright last question
if you had to pick one element of what
we were calling at least the ecosystem
hardware content services or software
what do you think it would be well they
work together the thing that I'll answer
a different question which is what was
the most surprising thing in 2011 and
and I and I think that is also my
question but i but i but i but i think i
think it will also answer that frame it
differently absolutely that sorry
be doing what the the power of the
ecosystem that you're describing it's
always a surprise to people when they
discover how powerful these ecosystems
are which i think is the point of your
panel and your whole meeting today and
it's even for me I've done this for 20
years I was surprised again at the power
of the ecosystems that have been built
and I say this with respect to the
Amazon ecosystem to the apple ecosystem
even to the Facebook ecosystem which
have similar characteristics in this
regard as well as obviously the google
one and the reason they're so powerful
and the reason your argument is so right
is that it's the fact that everyone is
working against this sort of cloud model
platform model means everybody's a
winner and because everybody is a winner
you get enormous essentially growth
effects you get this person helping you
and get this person helping you and you
get this application helping you and all
of these people can operate without your
knowledge and control the secret in
computing and these platforms is to make
them open enough and we would argue as
open as possible so that you can enable
enable the creative people whether it's
the content people the apps developers
the software developers or the consumers
to use them to love them to extend them
and so forth not only do you build
tremendous value you tremendous you
build tremendous loyalty they are
economically very very valuable to all
of the players right we haven't talked
very much about the other component
which is the ability to bring in money
but to be able to pay to pay for all
this infrastructure which is not cheap
so it's the sum of all of that and the
rate at which it has occurred that I
think has been the biggest surprise
great thank you very much you thank you
all thank you mom
good
thank you so much to Eric Schmidt now
that is of course the Google vision of
the ecosystem now though as you walk the
halls of this show obviously you see
consumer electronics manufacturers
everywhere people who have built their
brands and made all their money on
electronics so that brings us to a
slightly different take on the ecosystem
we've seen how ecosystems proceed when
their service centric offering search
video social and more on a largely
Hardware agnostic faces but what if
you're a leader in televisions or
smartphones or both and more how do you
keep wielding that advantage while
offering an operating system you didn't
develop apps you don't write and content
you don't own and still come out on top
and stay unique Hardware takes on a
different role in the ecosystem era but
never assume it doesn't matter Samsung
is behind a lot of the best-selling
smart phones and tvs with computers and
even connected refrigerators rounding
out the mix all available with one
flavor of ecosystem or another but
integrating outside platforms on your
hardware while maintaining your edge
through it and creating a unique
proposition is another flavor of the
ecosystem challenge and on the minds of
many in industry with deep roots in the
device
all right now if you'll join me now in
taking the ecosystem coin as we've seen
it and if not turning it completely over
turning it largely to a different side
and join me in welcoming tim baxter
president of sales marketing and
operations for samsung electronics
america have a seat okay hey Griffin I
need right choice or should I say he
brought crack that's we've got the note
we've got over what what have to see we
don't want that to get the headlines do
it they couldn't get actually brought
crack to CES I could not get the 75 inch
TV in my pocket so he can like a where's
the 55-inch oled it leaves will bring a
few goodies out all right now Tim we've
heard one still pulling them out just
it's still you like that like a cop you
got a belt full of goodies that you
brought out and surprised you didn't
wear your Imperial margarine crown
because you are not blowing smoke you
guys are emerging quick quickly as the
king of CES in presence in breadth and
scope and in ecosystem across the widest
product category as molly was mentioning
from connected white goods all the way
to the LED televisions laptops tablets
smart phones connected camera you
announced here as well tell me right off
the bat your first reaction is you're
watching listening to Eric's vision of
how they see the ecosystem I know the
definitions vary you guys are in a very
different space you make and live and
die on hardware that's your game how can
you be even in the same mindset as a
Google I know you guys are touching in
the same place in the industry but it
seems like these companies would be so
completely disparate in how they get
there I think what ties things together
in terms of the thinking is a consumer
orientation right and it really starts
in my mind with the the reality that you
know the average consumer has about 30
consumer electronics devices in their
home you don't think about all the
devices you have I there but very few of
them are connected to each other right
so really the opportunity in
and the expectation consumers have is to
bring that together in seamless and
relevant ways so I think that guides all
of the participants in in the value
chain associated with this so I see you
guys come into that picture absolutely
and most people in this room are
probably gonna think yeah Samsung is
going to do a piece of that maybe
they're going to bring in the Wi-Fi the
Bluetooth the beaming the link is the
infrastructure tell us why you have a
birthright to be in the software the
media the content and this kind of
gossamer that ties that together the
experience as we call it you know I
think you know what guides us I is a
continual passion and desire to enhance
the value of the product right I and you
start there and coupled with what the
consumers are looking for right and so
you really need to have that as really
the starting point on it and then trying
to add value that value comes across in
being able to share across devices we
believe I and recognizing that
everything isn't built in a common way
right technologies are evolving at
different paces and we're bringing in a
lot of disparate categories would have
historically been disparate categories a
refrigerator right and a television and
what is the glue that starts bringing
that together is the thing that really
motivates us and it's it's really again
driven by those expectations from a
consumer standpoint which brings up a
comment you may mean we talked to a
couple of weeks ago in preparing for
this and you said right now companies
paraphrasing walking a tightrope between
universal and proprietary to build your
own value and not just be bringing
Google on your platform like your
competitors might be you talked a lot
about being nimble is that another way
of saying we don't have all the answers
either right now oh I don't think
anybody really has all the answers right
i mean the pace of change in our
industry is pretty remarkable even
though we have been talking about these
same things for decades and i've been
coming to the show for several decades I
and but it's really happening now but
it's happening in so many different ways
and the level and the amount of
innovation I creates new possibilities
and new challenges so you have to be
nimble in being able to seize those
opportunities and that's what we focus
on so i wanna i want to get back to this
idea of you building in you samsung
building in the technology largely from
android we know that so well in your
products smartphones and tablets of
course then there's samsung apps you see
something missing an android or you
wouldn't have launched that platform
what is missing well i don't think
there's it's a case of its missing as as
Eric said we have a great partnership
with many people in this quote-unquote
ecosystem that we're talking about here
we have a great partnership with Google
in phones we are partnering with them
and developing things in the Google TV
space and it's well recognizing that
this is continuing to evolve we partner
with them and one of the launch partners
with chrome OS and the chrome pc so we
see that as a as a big part of this but
remember you know we've been in the
smart TV category since 2008 so we are
really been in it quite a while we have
a leading position in it we have about
1400 apps available now that's not
300,000 but that's this is a television
right so you need to make the apps
relevant to the entertainment experience
and that's what we focus on and so we
have continued to develop our strategy
and smart televisions and will continue
to do that but we're looking for new
ways and always looking for new and out
of ways have to further develop that I
think you just crossed a 20 million
download milestone on samsung apps so
let me put it this way what are
consumers finding that is missing
somewhere else by going to that app
space well I don't know if it's if it's
a case of missing I think the consumers
are bettering or different I think
consumers are just continuing to learn
and the phrase that the term that best
describes it is discover right they want
to discover things and they're
discovering ways to use the television
in a in a multi tasking society right we
are bombarded I mean just look at you
know the CNN or
ESPN window and you have lots of
different content is four or five
different stories go on consumers have
adapted to that you know our kids have
adapted to that faster than we have and
we are embracing that discovering
letting consumers discover new ways to
add value to that experience but we
think it has to be related to the
entertainment experience it's not a
Productivity experienced person it's not
a pure web surfing I want something that
relates to the experience then I have or
I want to discover new ways to be
entertained across device categories is
that the mission for samsung apps and
discovery in general or is that just a
television statement I think if you
think about our strategy in our sort of
view of the ecosystem I'm and I sort of
describe it this way is a you know if
you imagine a house right I in one of
the rooms you know we have a content
room right and that content is all the
content that consumers are comfortable
dealing with whether it's Google or
Netflix or Amazon or our own media hub
that offers a library of 5,000 movies
and shows but that is one room there's
also another room that we're focusing on
and we call it our signature services
which are unique services that we're
developing as specific to the to our
cross category strategy and underpinning
all of that is this glue or this tissue
and we focus there on how do we make it
seamless for consumers to move from
content from device to device or get
content from the cloud whether it's a
cloud service that Netflix managers or
some service that we might offer and so
our job really is the little where
statement of entering here it is I mean
and we are you know we are not a cloud
infrastructure company right we are an
entertainment coming we are a company
that's focused on adding value in
hardware and recognizing the industry
and the market and the consumer
expectations have dramatically shifted
you know from these discrete devices to
connected devices
and all of that innovation is happening
in a lot of great places our job is to
try to bring it together for consumers
in a seamless way and take out some of
the angst and frustration in that
process and thereby let them discover
new experiences some of the angst and
frustration I think comes from going to
your specialty and hardware device shop
if you look at apple and their roadmap
for products they're at a watershed high
for a number of phones they have three
right now actively in the market I would
imagine so a Grigori Android
manufacturers in general released three
a week right through the year where do
you detect a risk of device chop or the
consumer has a hard time saying I don't
know which samsung device I want maybe I
can be distracted by that confusion
isn't there a risk to that I think it's
a case of choice and I think consumers
want more than a couple choices right
I'm and you look at it in the car
industry you look at it in in the
electronics industry you look at it in
the clothing is people want choices and
we're about giving them choices right so
i have here my new galaxy s2 which is an
android based product that has ice cream
sandwich and i love it and i've
activated it right and that works and i
really enjoy it right samsung announced
yesterday this galaxy note right which
is actually i'm really a really unique
concept 5.3 inch you can do this very
android smartphone and it's got ability
to stretch a category but then again
always having to be careful as you talk
about the tightrope of not creating is
there is too much choice right i don't
know if it's too much choice i think it
is really this is what there could be
but there's yeah there's many choices
that exist out there it's our job to be
able to articulate the applications and
and be able to communicate to the
consumer relative to their needs i want
a device maybe that as a phone and truly
is a tablet and let's create something
new so we just created and seen the
growth in the tablet industry right
which morphed as a
between a tablet or a smartphone and a
pc now we've introduced something that's
actually in between a tablet and the
smartphone and it's about choice and how
many different devices do any want to
use and when do I want to use those
devices and that's where a product like
this fits it choice and hardware happens
far less frequently than choice in
content of course I may choose a phone
every two years a laptop every three a
tablet every three or four but I'm
choosing content may be several times a
day on a weekend where do you get into
unlocking the Hollywood treasure chest
can you be a role player in that many
people are looking at Apple to say they
can crack the code to get instead of the
few titles the many instead of the
Byzantine pricing plans the simple can
you and do you want to play a role in
cracking that code do you want to beat
him at that game I think our focus
really is to work with the content
providers and facilitate the the
delivery of the content to consumers
want on the devices they want so that's
really our mission we're not a Content
company we don't aspire to be a Content
company but as you mentioned kind of
middle way or a gossamer layer in there
can you be the one that brokers the
relationship perhaps from Hollywood to
Android by having some kind of a
leadership role I mean your presence is
been far greater than it was three years
ago in this business and I think we can
and I think we can do that I'm really
under the premise that the i believe the
content and community wants choices and
their providers in or distributing their
content so we provide that I think
opportunity for them the Google 20
samsung TV gets coming up win again I
tried all right I tried twice you tried
let's talk about the the role of you
mentioned earlier the idea of sync and
seamless relationship between devices
right now that's something of a simple
model the idea that I could pause the
movie on my tablet then when I go in the
house devices know that I want to pick
up the movie on the TV clever right now
not even that well done if doable but
feasible yeah what's more sophisticated
is to say I'm going to pause an
experience on one device and when I move
to a different user place the network of
devices and services i have we'll figure
out something different that I want to
do on that device because I'm not just
going to say okay I'm navigating in the
car I want to carry that to the house
watching a movie on the tablet well
maybe when I move to a different room
i'm not in that mode anymore is there a
place within samsung apps that you want
to be that layer of the next most
sophisticated sort of sink or what i
think of as intimacy transparency and
intuition yeah i think if you you know
the evolution of what is occurring here
is such that we've gone through a
process of simply making content
available in a stream fashion further
consumer right and that was one shift
that took place I'm we announced here
several applications and the list 24
hours around I'm being able to move the
content from device to device or buy it
once and use it in multiple places and
we think that's the next evolution
yesterday we announced an application
with technicolor MGO that allows me
access to to content on the television
but i also get relevant bonus content i
deleted scenes and games that may relate
to that experience available
simultaneously on my other devices so
you starting to see that that transition
and yes i think the expectation is and
we've worked with mso's on this I'm and
continue to do that I can stop and pause
and take it up on from the TV into the
car on my mobile device so that is it's
an area we're putting a great deal of
energy and we're working with content
companies and and distribution companies
to bring that experience alive again
it's one we think that is natural in
terms of the expectation for of
consumers you recently took on
additional duties that Samsung
Electronics America you've added
Enterprise to what was previously broad
consumer role yes congratulations thank
you for sure you're very busy the
enterprise role is not one that is
irrelevant to this crowd anymore if we
look at your ability to take market
share it's now a BYOD
world in the enterprise to some degree
more and more IT folks I speak to here
at the show yes bring your own device
within parameters those parameters seem
to be loosening within enterprises is
that perhaps the most ripe area you can
take share in the mobile space as
opposed to going head-on after let's say
on Apple share argument maybe it's a rim
share that you want to see is
low-hanging fruit for your mobile
devices certainly in smartphones it's
not much of a battle on tablets is that
yet across an enterprise consumer
cross-play that you can look at say
we're going to be the first to really
get in there and work with enterprise
and be their next blackberry their next
device that they really trust and work
with but also that delights in the
individual employee as an individual
yeah I think the biggest shift that I've
seen and now I've been managing the
enterprise for you know about five days
and so put that in context your life in
my lengthy experience no but I'm clearly
having been in this industry for you
know nearly 30 years I think the biggest
shift that I've seen is the technology
used to begin in the enterprise space
you know new technology and you think
about it in the video anything
interesting exact right here and now the
it's a consumerism that is driving the
enterprise space and and it is that
where consumers are coming in who are
also in the enterprise in the business
world like we all are here and saying I
want to use this device you know in my
network how do I do that and to see CIO
is trying to figure that out so I think
there's a big shift that has occurred
there and having that consumer
orientation we think is a valuable
component in understanding the
opportunities that exist for us in the
enterprise space because we've
historically been a consumer company but
we think there are huge opportunities
for samsung a company that is doing you
know about a hundred and fifty billion
dollars a year and we see significant
growth opportunities in the enterprise
space and a lot of that enterprise space
we believe is going to be connected
devices I die and so having that
understanding and learnings that we are
getting right now in the consumer space
we think will help
as consumers look for fitness devices or
other ways to use new technology and we
think the enterprise area is one of
those areas let's talk about some of
your children and how they may squabble
if we look at ultrabooks and tablets has
been a lot said about how the tablet
maybe has a lower ceiling in terms of
market acceptance than was first thought
we've gone through the iPad one hype
cycle there is large market share i
considered to be a major minority a
large niche ever you want to term it for
tablets that seems to be what's
happening especially as ultrabooks are
coming out and giving you kind of the
tablet experience with the file system
the human machine interface the more
powerful operating system and profit
processor base is is there an uneasy
battle between tablet and ultrabook in
terms of your spend on developing the
tablet we look at it as as opportunities
and anytime you have the fast-growing
category like tablets in just the same
way like pcs over the past few years I'm
you know there's going to be a lot of
segmentation that goes on you know and
that's what we're seeing here right in
its you know maybe we over defined it in
terms of whether it's this device as a
tablet or PC it's what do I want to get
out of this device right I want to be
able to get in and out of a device and
tablets have provided that we are just
introducing get to show off a new
Samsung device and this is our new
series 9 a notebook computer and if you
just look how thin this is in light
right and what it also offers is a boot
up time of less than 10 seconds our
consumers responding to the no
compromises here where the tablet has
some compromises as a large mobile
device and it's a function though of
what am I using it for right my kids are
using it and I often use my tablet as an
entertainment device with some easy
in-and-out access on productivity I
generally use my notebook as a
Productivity device with at times for me
occasional needs from an entertainment
space so I'm I like the ability to get
in and out of a pc and if i'm going to
write a
long email I like that capability I
enjoy waking up and grabbing I'm
necessarily enjoy but i have to i get
the the emails and get in and out and
get a few done very quickly and a tablet
or a smartphone provides that so again
we're giving consumers choices in a very
fast growing space but we think products
like this provide new opportunities and
new experiences for consumers that are
going to give them choices and in terms
of what they're doing all right there's
a story from hardware up please help me
to thank tim baxter who is president
sales marketing and operation samsung
electronics america all right folks now
we've now heard from two very
influential movers on very different
sides of the ecosystem argument largely
on the supply side if you want to look
at it that way but there are other
facets to this you can even call it
sides because there are so many
consumers retailers wholesalers and a
third sort of a blended group of
entrepreneurs and capital the list of
big names in the ecosystem is long but
our next panel will try to help the even
longer list of new players and
innovators grab a seat before the music
stops Blake Kerkorian is our inventor
and entrepreneur he has been described
as a veteran of the convergence Wars an
inventor investor and Amazon board
member under his belt slingbox a mobile
operating system telecom and consumer
electronics consulting one of the
earliest handheld PCs and a history of
growing technologies from embryo to
acquisition bill girly is the money man
he's general partner at benchmark
capital and his investment resume
includes clicker opentable Second Life
uber voodoo and shopping calm he's
engineered multiprocessor servers
analyze the IPO of no less than Amazon
and picks the winners for Wall Street
during the tech boom years these are the
guys who make it happen so whether
you're a brand new company or an old
established brand listen up let's figure
out how to make it all work all right
everyone please welcome Blake kerkorian
co-founder of Sling Media and CEO of ID
eight at all and Bill girly general
partner at benchmark cattle already yeah
whatever take this eliasson okay thank
you thanks guys nice to see you thanks
for joining like are we kind of dress
they do everything good I mean they go
here but we were gonna do the he was
gonna be dr. Eve allows me mini meal
come on I was gonna come out on a
BabyBjorn but he hurt his back laughs
I'm a little controversial I'm just
saying mr. onimous time your first here
still maybe I'm we can here to try that
later in the show yeah good thank you
back Slater so um first of all you guys
have been backstage hearing from people
you know well but here in the latest
viewpoints of where they're coming from
top line reactions right off the bat
what made you stroke your chin sagely
and saying it's very good or what the
hell was that anything on either of
those guys I like this I like this so
dare comment bye bye Eric someday I'll
be able get away with that um no I I
gosh you know I I think the way you guys
have framed the the overall sort of
session is is exactly right I you know
what I just couldn't help help doing was
it was shaking my head the whole time
that it's finally this is finally
happening and for guys like I mean Eric
I Eric was on the board of a company
that I worked worked at back in the
early 90s called general magic and
general magic had a an operating system
for for intelligent devices Sony and
motorola had both built products of
physical products based on but they also
had a networking programming language
that a whole vision of an electronic
marketplace pre-internet was going to
happen in guys like a teen teen France
Telecom are going to build and we always
had this saying of sort of it was the
ecosystem was framed in a different way
which was vehicles highways and
destinations
and and it was pitched as a ten-year
roadmap and I was just realizing it's
like I was we the vision was right it
just wasn't the tenure roadmap feels
like a 25-year roadmap um and it's just
it's just finally there and it's just
amazing to see it all you know come to
fruition and would you say that we're
there I mean though certainly the
premise of this session is that we're
there and everybody is hoping to be
there in terms of connecting all the
different dots do you think we're there
and how well i think it's interesting
you know i think from having a connected
device in your home we're there right so
i worked with voodoo there and like 40
million devices now installed devices
and and so almost every one of you have
some type of device that allow you to
get to youtube and almost everyone has
ethernet in the back of their television
so from that perspective we're there I
think there were two things people
people expected to happen and I even
Brian heard you mentioned this one is
everyone expected Hollywood to get run
over and that that would be a sign that
did it happen and that didn't happen
Hollywood one round one of this digital
you know they didn't get their
distribution models torn up ever they
didn't get ala carte pricing they were
able to maintain their power and they
were very adept at how they did that and
then the second thing is I think we all
kind of hoped that some startup would
emerge as the UI of the connected
television that didn't happen either and
the one thing I take away from the
earlier sessions is just listening to
Eric talk about Android you know I will
go out on lemmon say that I actually
think Google's Android execution may be
the most aggressive strategic initiative
in the history of business like not to
history attack the history of business
what are they protecting the search yeah
I mean look search is a fabulous
business and if you look at search on
the pc you know there were threats to it
so firefox right had that little bar and
google had to pay firefox to protect
that bar and if it weren't for the
consent decree IE would have been much
more integrated with being than it has
been and so there was this opportunity
to be above search in the lair and take
Google away from this incredible gold
mine that it has called search so when
they saw new platforms coming they
decided hey we're going to come up
the way to make sure that there's no one
standing around us and getting in the
way of that search and it's protecting
search beyond just the search we know
the box we're talking about but to a
higher level of discovery right sure
sure sir I mean SD the evolution of
search which might include discovery of
content certainly includes maps where
they've probably invested another 700
million dollars ease but but it's just
amazing you know the momentum that they
have so what are they doing wrong if
they're they seem best position to pull
it off although there is a growing
there's a growing chorus despite what
Eric says from users about what they
term fragmentation well if the
fragmentation and and I don't think that
Eric would deny it that fragmentation of
the platform is a challenge it most
certainly is and I didn't hear him say
anything different to that you know and
and of course one person's open is
another person's closed from the
standpoint of I want everything to be
open so long as it's my AP is and
everything else right so there's
probably a little bit of that from Eric
but that's you know that's that's to be
expected you know I think that that the
fragmentation will continue to be the
challenge as as well as the strength of
the platform and you just kind of see
how those things play out I mean it was
always amazing to me I remember as a kid
growing up in mountain view you know
very close to where Apple was born and I
could never understand why anybody would
buy a PC just because I would say those
products did not work and why wouldn't
everyone by an apple well you know we
saw what happened there and so from this
from that standpoint look at history you
you think android you know can be can be
and will be hugely successful that's not
going to that's not to say it won't be
without it it's sort of growing pains
well that leads to another question
actually I'm hoping that you'll talk to
us a little bit about Amazon ah does do
you need all of these devices or can you
do a really strong sort of content does
amazon need a phone or is it okay for
them to power sort of a killer
experience on a couple devices well i
mean first off i'm on the board and i'm
not so i'm not a liberal comment on on
behalf of amazon
but I am a customer and I I also i think
that looked I mean from Amazon's
perspective I bought my last android
phone on Amazon it wasn't from amazon so
who really cares i think i think you
know Amazon's vision of being the most
consumer centric company in the world
remains true and I think though you know
they'll pick certain places where
perhaps the experience they were trying
to provide did not exist in fact here's
an interesting thing I remember always
tellin of our folks at sling when new
people would come in and try to try to
talk about the approach here because
everyone goes it's at hardware is it
software is it services right and and I
remember even trying to raise raise
money unfortunately I didn't get
rejected by Bill we got rejected by a
lot of guys but you know first off you
can go and raising money people like are
you a hardware company or you were
software company and you know I would
say like okay we're both I word
experience company but look if I have to
try to put it in buckets we're a
software company who's now selling our
software in a box of silicon okay and
what we tell what I tell people at sling
is the approach is always look you first
focus on what's the experience you want
to provide then off of that you then say
okay well what software needs to be
developed in order to deliver that
experience and then off of that is is
their hardware that exists today that
can develop and deliver that experience
if there's not you then we'll build the
hardware and I think there's cases like
the Kindle e-reader where they talked
about the reading experience and the
buying experience and then the software
and they said look no one else is making
these products with the battery life and
visibility and so we need to go solve
that problem besides that I mean they're
very much Switzerland as well as like as
long as other people providing fantastic
experiences they'll be happy to sell but
Molly I think you bring up a good point
which is these these major ecosystems do
overlap so you know amazon has
historically sold analog media books
records and and so if they want to be in
that future they have to find a way to
do something that Apple's doing right
Facebook gets revenue from zynga they
take thirty percent of that game apple
takes revenue as a distributor of game
so Apple and Facebook and I think that's
one of the reasons why
book has struggled to get there their
Apple products out on time now I think
Apple made one mistake and I think apple
doesn't hasn't made many mistakes but I
think they may one crucial mistake in
that they got greedy on the rake so I
think the thirty percent rate alienated
amazon and Facebook and they shouldn't
have done that with with Android coming
they should have made Facebook and
Amazon their best friends had them
deeply integrated into iOS the way
twitter is and that should have happened
and that would have helped apple and
they got greedy on the rate and now
we've got a multi-faceted war with lots
of big guys out there pounding around
what the Samsung have to worry about or
defend against heard a lot about how
they're hitting a lot of cylinders I
think a few things I mean first off let
Samsung has has come from from you know
being potentially out of business back
in I remember the late 90s and to being
the powerhouse they are today so they
deserve a ton of a ton of kudos there I
think Samsung just like any of you know
any of these other consumer electronics
companies besides apple back to my
comment about experiences software and
then hardware all those you know most of
the companies here they have it
ass-backwards they start with the
hardware and kind of build up and and
that's continuing to be I think a
challenge like you know you know just to
just to maybe point out one little tiny
one one little tiny knit in a product
but you know that that Samson created to
the point that Eric was making about you
don't just deliver the the product with
the spec sheet and the and the
checkboxes it's got to work so somehow
there should be some rule where you know
maybe people can vote and it's like if a
product has a feature and enough people
vote and say the feature doesn't work
they have to remove it from the list of
things but you know so like so like take
the Samsung television and again I've
just bought three Samsung televisions so
I mean I thought it was the best TV out
there that being said I'm really into
into some control and multi-screen sort
of things and I got all excited at first
I said oh wow you know the samsung TV
comes with this iphone interface or
iphone app that lets you control your
television set and I thought okay wow
that's great you know that's that really
is forward thinking and so forth
and then I went to go use it and I
realized that well it did do all the
things except for it was missing one
very very important command probably the
most important command of anything from
controlling your TV what do you think
that command was turning it on actually
you couldn't turn it on because guess
what the you know the ethernet the
ethernet chip was asleep when the TV was
off so therefore I had to go grab my
other darn remote my our remote hit the
button and then I can go control it and
so it's just it's understanding that
those details are so critical it's not
just about getting the feature and
saying hey I now have it just like the
other guy does but do I have it it just
sounds so basic do I have it and does it
work and and you know I think that
Samsung understands that they need to
keep improving just like all these other
companies think Samsung and HTC are
probably the two that have shown the
most progress there but that's still a
huge challenge for these guys bill
Simpson Achilles heels for them as an
instructive lesson for a variety of
companies that have their general
struggle I think I think they've
benefited by almost by not being overly
caught up in their own you know way of
viewing things you know I contrast it
with Sony who has all these visions of
their own software stack and all these
kind of things whereby they can't kind
of get their arms around the open
standards that are out there or you know
in this case Android and so being their
first I think that's been helpful to
them I think in the long run they'll
face the same challenges that a Adele
faced in the PC world and you know I
think it's a very similar and I think
it's a great analogy for what's going on
here which is based on what I see
androids just getting started it's going
to become very dominant in in every home
and car and and all these kind of things
and once that happens you know then a
whole new set of challenges will arise
for how you differentiate a big favor
seems like you're arguing for you know
inadvertently arguing for Android as a
plug-and-play solution for these
hardware manufacturers so it's not their
core competency all right look I think
out yeah absolutely no no please I'm
just saying it's
late I think the catch out of the back I
mean you look at how things become self
reinforcing the one as I walked around
the show today the one thing that just
really really blew me away was you know
looking at the synergy between arm and
Android and so you go look at you know
in the marvel booth you know at what
they're doing with the ARM processor
they've got these little demo boxes for
connected TVs the kits are like 20 bucks
but the point is there's all this
ecosystem that's building around that
and you know Snapdragon and you know at
Qualcomm so Qualcomm marvel you know all
these semiconductor companies are doing
these arm cores that are 99 cents and
you know they're all doing it on Android
because the windows 8 thing just got
announced last night and it doesn't
exist and that's just monstrous amounts
of effort and that all leads to
experimentation it leads to cost
reduction and it's just a tsunami well
well n and the point I mean Eric yo eric
said something else that I think is
absolutely dead on which is they have
delivered on the openness from the
standpoint of letting people actually
fragment or differentiate he'd rather
see the differentiation but they're
allowing the fragmentation frankly
fragmentation it bad it also equates to
innovation and and to allow the
innovation to happen I mean a perfect
little little project I've been working
on the past couple years was I was
trying to do a bunch of home automation
and control of my house and my first
thing I was going to use iOS devices as
a main control point and you know what
when it came down to like using that
iPad as a remote control or something or
putting the iPad in the wall it was a
horrible experience because I didn't
want have to walk up to the damn thing
and and swipe to unlock it it's like the
damn thing should like just have the
proximity sensor and turn on and I even
know the guys in cupertino so I'm
calling to see if they could let me kind
of work around that no no no no no it
you know brought me over just as a
developer brought me over into that
Android platform because then I can just
go ahead and just tweak this UI as much
as I want and and and Google is
investing in developer relations the way
Microsoft actually that's a very good
point 25 years ago which by the way the
guy who runs Android and started Android
used to Andy Rubin used to work at
general magic there are 20 years ago so
it's kind of interesting so you
go to if you go to the Android developer
relations team first of all they're just
so happy to see it what can we do for
you you know just like Microsoft using
tails wagging but when you say hey I
want a device that auto starts or I want
a device that's locked down they go
here's 300ms they're developing hardware
like that hears it and so you're you
know you're right and calling them out
for the fragmentation but it won't be a
failure it'll be a benefit I was in an
AT&T store over Christmas and just
looking at the layouts there were three
iphone stations and 20 Android station
and within their there's one with a big
screen want a little screen one with a
keyboard this way one of the keyboard
this way and you know people are walking
around and looking at I'm trying to
think about what they want and so the
real reason we want to get you guys on
stage is because you're both
entrepreneurs and and or the money guys
what do you do if you're new if you're a
new player right in this new world where
it feels like you maybe have to have a
hardware solution to contact bunch of
content deals some maps is it possible
to break in or are you pretty much as an
app developer what will come across your
desk tomorrow that you would get real
excited yeah no no it's your desktop
money sorry Gail it's your desk let's
look at bills desk you know it's tough
you know I've worked with two incredible
teams of Voodoo team and a clicker team
and we had good outcomes but they
weren't blow away outcomes and there's a
lot of power players i mean with what
Google is doing with Android you know
it's going to it's going to destroy a so
much market cap you know it's already
happened to rim and Nokia and you know
and you know telling avin you know I
think garmin's you know and got a lot of
you know with the and so it's with that
big a force out there it's hard it's
hard to find a high ground and then
Hollywood you know is played this game
extremely well so you know who Luke took
two hundred million dollars and a ton of
proprietary content to get off the
ground and Netflix is now looks like
they're going to have to spend a billion
dollars in content so I think you're
going to have to you know I'll give you
an example of someone who has done it
and I've been blown away as the GoPro
guys you know so it was off the beaten
path they weren't trying to take over
the
old world or one that was highly
choreographed they went to a new market
and really blew it away really nailed it
built a product is differentiated around
that use case but it was a new use case
and they got out in front of a huge wave
and they've done an amazing job they
started at they started at the
experience they started the experience
in the lifestyle and work their way down
and you know you can bet the label they
probably don't have much in the way of
DSP engineers doing image sensing
technology in that that's not what it's
about um you know and so I I think that
there's I continue to believe that that
there is a huge opportunity for entrance
in all pay places in the ecosystem I
happen to love gadgets and and and love
the hardware element and and I think
that on one hand it's it's certainly a
tough business and you have to have your
act together all the way through it's
not just about boobs you kind of messed
up on a dram chip and you know now you
can just hit the reset button and start
over it's you just bought you know
hundred thousand one hundred thousand
units of inventory you're screwed so so
you got I really have your act together
and there's huge barriers but there's
still such an opportunity for companies
who understand all those pieces but
actually and understand how to approach
it again from the experience on down
because I think it's going to take a
long time for these traditional hardware
companies to really really reinvent how
they how they how they approach things
you know besides that you know the start
is hard and it is getting harder and
harder and harder is no question you
know the other the other thing from from
from startup companies it's about mean
obviously being disruptive right if you
can find out where you can disrupt in a
particular area maybe there's an
established player who's got a you know
huge market share and there you see
something some evolution that's going to
happen and it's just hard for them to
move you know that's I think they're
still going to be opportunities but they
are becoming tougher and tougher yeah
all right great guys ladies and
gentleman please thank join us in
thanking our two panelists here at the
next big thing Blake kerkorian and
really
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