ITV

Tag: Santa Barbara

  • Meet the brains behind Caavo, India-designed unique STB

    MUMBAI: Meet the brains who founded the unique Caavo, a device that delivers a unified TV experience where devices and services come together to offer ultimate control. Caavo TV box serves as a universal control system for cord cutters that have multiple streaming boxes. The device is equipped with voice recognition, and can find specific content requested across your TV sets and your cable box.

    Ashish Aggarwal is one of the co-founders of Caavo who is working on this successful project since June 2015. Before founding Caavo, Aggarwal, an MS and PhD (electrical engineering) from University of California, Santa Barbara, was employed by Violet3D between May 2009 and June 2015 in Bangalore, prior to which he worked with Harman International for over an year as the director of advanced technology in Los Angeles.

    The other co-founder is Vinod Gopinath who started working on Caavo in March 2015. Before Caavo happened, Gopinath, a post-graduate from XLRI Jamshedpur, was employed as Snap Networks COO since September 2012 in India before which he served on the board of directors of shufflr.tv (althea systems).

    Caavo delivers a unified TV experience. Rather than attempting to consolidate into one box, Caavo connects all of the pieces: pay TV, streaming, and gaming, then unites the experience. The power of Caavo lies in its ability to combine fragmented entertainment devices and the vast, yet ever changing content across all of them into something magical. Caavo’s HDMI output can be connected either directly to a TV or through an [AV Receiver]. Caavo supports Dolby and DTS pass thru from source to the AVR.

    By interconnecting pay TV, streaming, and gaming, Caavo brings together your devices, services and control. They work together seamlessly, making it easy to find and play all of TV.

    Also Read

    http://www.indiantelevision.com/dth/dth-services/dth-stbs-interoperability-to-be-ensured-with-meity-bis-help-170210

    http://www.indiantelevision.com/dth/dth-services/dish-tv-ali-tie-up-chipset-tech-vital-for-secure-vas-enriched-viewing-170211

    http://www.indiantelevision.com/iworld/telecom/mobitv-powers-jio-live-receives-us-21m-for-ip-based-video-sans-stb-170222

  • Disney visual effects veteran Peter Ellenshaw dies at 93

    Disney visual effects veteran Peter Ellenshaw dies at 93

    MUMBAI: Peter Ellenshaw, the Oscar winning visual effects pioneer and matte artist who is known for his work on several Disney classics like Mary Poppins, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Darby O’Gill and the Little People, Treasure Island and The Black Hole, passed away at his home in Santa Barbara on 12 February at the age of 93.

    Announcing his demise, an official statement referred to him as “a hand-picked member of Walt Disney’s creative team.” Ellenshaw was called upon to create a wide variety of visual effects for the Studio’s films, and even painted the iconic first map of Disneyland that was featured on all the early postcards and souvenir booklets.

    Ellenshaw regarded Walt Disney as a source of inspiration, a wonderful executive, and over the years, a good friend. “Walt had the ability to communicate with artists,” observed Ellenshaw. “He’d talk to you on your level — artist to artist. He used to say, ‘I can’t draw, Peter.’ But he had the soul of an artist, and he had a wonderful way of transferring his enthusiasm to you.”

    Ellenshaw began his association with Walt Disney in 1947, when he was tapped to work on the Studio’s first live-action film, Treasure Island (1950), and continued working there until his retirement in 1979 following The Black Hole. Born in Great Britain in 1913, Ellenshaw began his film career in the early 1930s, when he apprenticed for visual effects pioneer W. Percy (Pop) Day, O.B.E. He worked on such productions as Things to Come, Rembrandt, Elephant Boy, Sixty Glorious Years, A Matter of Life and Death, and the Michael Powell-Emeric Pressburger classic Black Narcissus.

     

  • SPTI expands mobile entertainment team

    SPTI expands mobile entertainment team

    MUMBAI: Sony Pictures Television International (SPTI) has expanded its mobile entertainment team to better serve its existing and new clients.

    SPTI is adding executives to oversee its mobile teams in Asia-Pacific and Latin America, and providing additional support from SPTI’s headquarters in Culver City, California.

    SPTI senior VP, mobile entertainment, Jason Wells says, “Sony Pictures is firmly committed to growing its mobile entertainment business, and is dedicating significant resources to ensure its future growth. With the global team in place, SPTI’s mobile entertainment group will provide not only content from blockbuster movies such as Casino Royale, but also be a single source for SPE’s integrated mobile offerings ranging from TV series on mobile to interactive games.”

    In the Asia-Pacific region, SPTI’s mobile entertainment team has appointed Rosemary Tan as director, mobile entertainment, Asia-Pacific, reporting to Wells. Based at SPTI’s Asia headquarters in Hong Kong, Tan joins SPTI from Universal Music Asia in Hong Kong where she was regional new media director and head of new media business development since 2003.

    Rose Tsang is SPTI manager, mobile entertainment, Asia-Pacific. Tsang was previously senior new media manager at Universal Music Asia in Hong Kong where she worked with Tan. Tsang will be responsible for implementing and managing mobile strategies, as well as content delivery workflow management.

    Andy Bishop, based in Los Angeles, has been promoted to VP, sales and business development, mobile entertainment. Reporting to Wells, he will be directly responsible for sales and distribution in Canada, Latin America and Brazil, and will work with all of SPTI’s regional offices around the world, overseeing business development and sales strategy with mobile operators and other strategic wireless partners worldwide.

    He was previously SPTI’s director, business development and sales planning, mobile entertainment. Prior to joining Sony, he was manager, business development at Disney.

    SPTI’s mobile entertainment team has also expanded in Latin America with the appointment of Stephen Brough as director, mobile entertainment, Latin America, reporting to Bishop. Based at SPTI’s Latin American headquarters in Miami, Brough heads the mobile entertainment team for the region. Brough and his team are responsible for business development and the sale of mobile TV/video, games and personalization products to mobile operators and customers throughout the region.

    Brough previously held a number of executive positions at VSNL International (formerly Teleglobe) in Miami since 2003, most recently as mobile content sales specialist. Prior to that, he served in various executive posts at Sirius Telecom in Santa Barbara, CA, Vonova Communications in Austin, and at Ernst & Young Consulting in Buenos Aires and Lima. He began his career as a business consultant at Andersen Consulting working in Dallas, Kansas City, and New York.

    SPTI’s mobile entertainment team is charged with extending Sony’s theatrical and TV assets, as well as its range of custom-made mobile content, into mobile distribution outside the US. With mobile product such as the James Bond franchise, the Ratchet and Clank Going Mobile game adaptation from the popular Sony PlayStation franchise, and Spider-Man 3 mobile content, SPTI is the international distribution and marketing arm for SPE’s portfolio of mobile content, including mobile games, such as Wheel of Fortune, tones, images, video and text programmes.