Robert Andrews

LAS VEGAS — A just-announced new video series on health innovations presented by a TV news anchor will not be the only foray WebMD makes in to video this year. Earlier this month, the health publisher previewed “Future of Health with Robin Roberts”, a digital mini-series fronted by the Good Morning America co-host. It will be […]

LAS VEGAS — The way TV ads are bought and sold is about to look a lot more like the web – but the web will have to look like TV first, says the chairman of the world’s largest media investment agency. “Television is sold on a 30-second spot basis, while digital is sold on […]

LAS VEGAS — The burgeoning array of internet-connected TVs won’t change the industry just because they are connected to the internet – they also offer new ways to interact with content. “In an OTT (over-the-top) environment, it’s a more dynamic environment,” Rob Aksman, founder of BrightLine, which enables interactive ads for brands on interactive TV […]

LAS VEGAS — Cisco used its visit to the Consumer Electronics Show to talk about new set-top box capabilities it is giving pay-TV operators. Company CTO Ken Morse, in this video interview with Beet.TV, talks about: Kabel Deutschland – A new box coming next year will meld live, on-demand, catch-up and time-shifted TV with internet video. […]

LAS VEGAS — Networks technology vendor Ericsson has a conception of the media world in five years’ time. “The Networked Society… our vision for the year 2020 – everything that can benefit from connection to the internet will indeed will be connected,” Ericsson content delivery marketing head Lisa Skelton tells Beet.TV. “Of those 50bn connected devices, 15bn will, at […]

LAS VEGAS — Rights restrictions traditionally have made it a challenge for many a digital platform to grab content. But Diffusion Group senior analyst Joel Espelien says one TV content type is lagging behind the others. “We’ve seen the rise of entertainment programming making it on to multiple screens – but we didn’t really see that with sports,” he tells […]

LAS VEGAS — A digital media world in which TV manufacturers keep changing their underlying smart operating systems risks wrong-footing and frustrating content owners, says Ovum TV principal analyst Paul Jackson. “A number of manufacturers here have switched horses in terms of what their OS is going to be,” Jackson tells Beet.TV in this video […]

LAS VEGAS — Broadcast networks, peeved that TV audiences are moving to platforms for which they don’t have big live sports rights, are likely to try negotiating hard when rights are due for renewal. “Broadcasters have paid godawful sums of money,” Paul Sweeting, a media analyst who consults through his own Concurrent Media Strategies and writes for […]

LAS VEGAS — The New York Times wants to make a big deal out of crafting sponsored articles for advertisers on mobile. “Native is the ad format for mobile … discoverable in-stream right alongside our own content,” says ad products SVP Michael Zimbalist. “We see a big opportunity for The New York Times and for […]

LAS VEGAS — Oculus Rift may have been conceived for playing games, but marketers increasingly view it as a place to communicate messages. “360-degree, immersive experiences are really starting to explode now,” according to DigitasLBi technology SVP Tony Bailey. He calls virtual reality “a new way of thinking about storytelling”. “If you’re in beverages and you […]

LAS VEGAS — One year after it was merged with Group M stablemate 24/7 Media, programmatic ad tech division Xaxis expects more industry M&A in 2015. “We always talk about how much movement there is in the industry,” says Xaxis chief revenue officer Nicolle Pangis. “But the fact is, that’s the norm in this industry. Every […]

LAS VEGAS — The more social networks across which brands attempt real-time marketing, the more channels they have to monitor for resonance. One Canadian startup, DIVE  Networks, wants to help out with that. “The landscape for brands is very complex. it’ so hard to keep up with real-time marketing,” CEO Deborah Hall, who previously founded […]

LAS VEGAS — The emerging age of targeted TV advertising will mean an end to reaching viewers based on the shows they watch and instead usher in individual viewer profiling. “Advertisers (today) are overwhelmingly buying audience … using content as a proxy for that audience,” according to Adobe Primetime’s principle product evangelist Noah Levine. “That’s […]

LAS VEGAS — 4K TVs were all the rage at the Consumer Electronics Show – but 4K content for those shiny new screens was not so much in evidence. The chicken-and-egg problem likely involves the realization that, today, broadband pipes just aren’t big enough to deliver next-generation TV quality en masse. “We know that customers […]

LAS VEGAS — After six years of chronicling the mobile consumption marketplace with its annual insights reports, mobile analytics firm Flurry, recently purchased by Yahoo, says the medium has reached new heights. “We’ve seen usage of mobile grow 76% year over year,” CEO Simon Khalaf tells Beet.TV in this video interview. “That’s insane growth – […]

LAS VEGAS — If a consumer ripped a clip of your content and posted it to YouTube, would you chase her with a lawyer’s notice? Zach James would embrace the act. The co-CEO of video rights management and branding solutions startup ZEFR says his company “makes sense of the 90% of the videos that you […]

LAS VEGAS — Microsoft is changing the way it works with advertisers, according to the woman recently hired to lead its US brand marketing relationships. “We are going through company-wide, top-down change,” Ritu Trivedi, who joined from being MediaVest’s USA digital marketplace VP in October, tells Beet.TV in this video interview. “The product teams are now […]

LAS VEGAS — Don’t go expecting any major bumps in the economic road in the year ahead. The CEO of the world’s biggest ad agency holding group, WPP, says 2015 will have a familiar look. “Overall, I see ’15 being slightly better than ’14,” Sir Martin Sorrell tells Beet.TV in this video interview. “This time […]

LAS VEGAS — So-called “programmatic” TV advertising, in which TV ads would be traded with digital targeting and efficiency, is coming a long way – but still has key challenges to address if it is to reach the heights many hope for, according to one sector exec. “We’re in a nascent timeframe for programmatic TV. It’s […]

LAS VEGAS — European advertisers are taking to video advertising and so-called “programmatic” online ad technologies at varying progressive degrees, according to GroupM Interaction UK MD Jakob Nielsen. “(In the) UK … TV buyers are constantly looking to new audiences,” Nielsen tells Beet.TV in this video interview. “With video… in the diminishing-return space, all of a […]