Trade association DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group will hold its second annual EnTech Fest on March 29 at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles.
This year’s event will feature feature exhibits, an expanded conference program and DEG’s annual reception in a new single-day format.
The digital entertainment industry trade show and networking event, attended by DEG studio and platform members and others, focuses on innovation in post-theatrical content display and distribution.
The expanded conference program includes a keynote panel addressing cloud architecture and other supply chain innovation, “The Future of Distribution Now,” moderated by Pixelogic’s Craig Seidel, with Amazon Web Services’ Chris Blandy, Amazon Studios’ Ellen Goodridge and Lionsgate’s Gray Ainsworth.
A separate keynote conversation will pair Creative Artists Agency’s Joanna Popper with Paramount Global’s Ted Schilowitz in “Transforming Storytelling Through Immersive Entertainment and New Technologies.”
Other conference sessions include “8K — Creating a New Way,” a panel discussion on the various ways 8K technology is elevating the creative experience, and the 90-minute “Innovative Tech for M&E | Quick Roundtables with Intel Capital Startups,” in which the tech giant’s venture capital arm will host exclusive roundtable discussions with 10 startups offering cutting-edge technology for the media and entertainment industry.
Last year’s EnTech Insights market research presentations will return with presentations from Omdia, discussing how CTV, FAST and AVOD are shaping the new TV and video landscape, and TiVo, sharing insights on the video option being brought to automotive dashboards.
A “FAST to the Future: How to Thrive in Ad-supported Streaming” panel, led by IRIS.TV’s Field Garthwaite, will discuss what content owners need to do to achieve FAST success in ad-supported streaming.
New opportunities for private meetings and attendee networking are also being added, including a networking lunch and event app.
DEG says its staff created the new format and expanded conference program with an advisory group including executives from Amazon, Dolby, Intel, LG Electronics, Looper Insights, NBCUniversal, Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros. Discovery, XL8 Inc. and Xperi.
“EnTech Fest in 2022 was a highly successful first-time event by many measures, including exhibition support, attendance and perceived value within our digital entertainment industry,” said Amy Jo Smith, president and CEO of the DEG. “The DEG team listened very carefully to our first-year attendees and exhibitors and is using their feedback to make EnTech even better in 2023.
“This includes the creation of additional relevant conference programming and more opportunities for networking and for our participants to work together in-person at the event. We know this face time has become even more valuable to potential attendees in this era of remote work.”
Focus exhibit categories for 2023 include advanced content delivery solutions, artificial intelligence, immersive storytelling, localization services, and new in- home entertainment technologies and hardware.
Companies supporting the event as sponsors or exhibitors include 360 Solutions, 8K Association, Blintn, Blu Digital Group, Boxx, Circana, Deep Media, Dolby, Giant Worldwide, Globant, Google TV, Intel, Intel Capital, iSize, Iyuno, LG, NetApp, P1 Technologies, Omdia, Pixelworks, Premiere Digital, Sony, Spherex, Tubi, Vubiquity, XL8, Xperi (TiVo/DTS) and Yoom.
The inaugural EnTech Fest in May 2022 drew more than 500 industry attendees to Skirball for business-to-business trade displays and networking.
Companies interested in exhibiting should contact DEG director of sales and membership service Andi Elliott (Andi@degonline.org).
NEWS ANALYSIS — The dawning of a new year brings to the home entertainment sector, both streaming and transactional, a host of challenges and questions — and a few opportunities.
Challenges include a nation that once again is on the threshold of a recession, prompting a rash of recent layoffs and cutbacks at most of the big studios as well as streamers. Compounding the cloudy economic outlook is the fact that Hollywood is in the midst of serious self-examination, at the center of which is the question of streaming’s sustainability as a business model, given the escalating cost of content and limited returns under cheap all-you-can-watch subscription plans.
Questions include: How will recent moves into even lower-priced advertising-supported subscription plans play out for Netflix and Disney+? What will the merger of HBO Max and Discovery+ look like, particularly given the late-2022 bloodletting of content from Max? Will there be more consolidation among the big streaming services? And what of the shrinking transactional market, in which consumers rent or buy specific movies, TV shows and other content either digitally or on DVD or Blu-ray Disc?
And yet there are still opportunities. In conversations with industry leaders, the word we hear most is synergies, since except for Netflix the leading streamers are all part of big media companies that also include theatrical and traditional, transactional home entertainment businesses.
The theatrical business, which has traditionally been the launching pad for movies, has been torn apart by streamers buying and even producing their own content — and studios owned by media companies giving their streaming sisters preferential treatment.
Gower Street Analytics projects the 2023 worldwide box office will improve to a projected $29 billion in ticket sales from an estimated 2022 total of $25.8 billion, but that’s still a good 30% below pre-pandemic 2019 box office revenue of $42.3 billion. Part of the reason is fewer movies being released to theaters, which then also hurts transactional home entertainment, which used to be the critical “second window” studios looked for to prop up theatrical underperformers while boosting the overall bottom line.
Bob Buchi
And yet Bob Buchi, president of worldwide home media for Paramount Pictures, is optimistic for the transactional side of the business heading into 2023, citing a rash of high-profile theatrical releases slated for next year and maintaining quality is more important than quantity.
“In 2023 the theatrical slate across the industry promises to be even more robust and consistent than it was in 2022, and we at Paramount are especially enthusiastic about the sales and drafting opportunities we’ll have with the return of key franchises like ‘Mission: Impossible,’ ‘Transformers,’ ‘Scream,’ ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ and ‘Paw Patrol,’” Buchi says.
“Home entertainment remains very important to collectors and cinephiles who appreciate the best-possible quality audio and video presentation and the compelling bonus features, while general audiences appreciate the broad selection and flexibility to access their favorite films whenever they want.”
Michael Bonner
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment president Michael Bonner agrees.
“The market will likely remain very fragmented with different release strategies across the studios,” he says. “But Universal is very optimistic, given our strategy, and is excited about the opportunity in 2023 to drive further growth across the category with our exceptionally diverse slate, including Fast X, The Super Mario Bros. Movie and Oppenheimer.”
Adam Frank, SVP of global digital sales and distribution at Lionsgate, also takes pride in his studio’s slate of theatrical releases, the success of which he expects to trickle down to traditional home entertainment.
“We have a robust slate in 2023 that includes John Wick: Chapter 4; The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes; Expendables 4; Judy Blume’s timeless Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret; The Blackening; a new installment in the billion-dollar ‘Saw’ franchise; and a new Dirty Dancing sequel starring and produced by Jennifer Grey, among many others,” he says. “With this lineup, we expect to see continued acceleration in the transactional space.”
Jason Spivak
Transactional and subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) should not be seen as mutually exclusive, particularly if smart windowing leads to synergies between the two entertainment consumption models, says Jason Spivak, EVP of distribution for North America television and home entertainment at Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Indeed, Sony, which has no proprietary standalone streaming service, in 2021 signed separate distribution deals with Netflix and Disney+ worth a reported combined $3 billion for exclusive Pay 1 TV (streaming) access to its theatrical releases through 2026. Those movies used to go to Starz, HBO, Epix, FX and Showtime. Netflix paid big for the first rights, with Disney+ getting access after Netflix’s 12- to 18-month window.
“This deal establishes a new source of first-run films for Netflix movie lovers,” Scott Stubler, Netflix’s head of original films, said in a statement.
Sony’s Spivak says transactional and streaming can happily co-exist and service consumers in different ways at different moments. Transactional affords consumers the benefits of movie collection building while streaming appeals to consumers when they may be more casual in their movie consumption interests.
“As such, we do not look at it as an either-or type of choice for our audiences,” he says.
On the TV series side, Spivak says, “We have seen streaming become a primary platform for audiences to enjoy our new and classic shows, offering convenience for consumers to discover and binge.
“With that said, for certain shows transactional remains [the best] way to access and collect the latest seasons and episodes, as evidenced by the performance of ‘Better Call Saul,’ which is our best-performing season ever in terms of digital sellthrough in the first six months of release.”
Paramount’s Bob Buchi agrees. “The industry will continue to experiment market by market with windowing, pricing and release strategies,” he says. “At Paramount, we are working more collaboratively than ever with our colleagues in theatrical and at Paramount+ to leverage our joint consumer messaging and maximize our marketing spend in the most effective way possible.”
In 2022, he says, “We launched Orphan: First Kill simultaneously in a limited theatrical run, on PVOD/PEST, and on Paramount+, allowing consumers to decide their viewing preference. We found that the combined messaging and collective effort caused all boats to rise and the film was successful across all platforms.
“That strategy is contrasted with Top Gun: Maverick, which obviously had one of the most unprecedented theatrical runs in recent history. After generating nearly $1.5 billion at the global box office, the film became a massive success across home entertainment platforms and the No. 1 best-selling digital release of all time, all based on a more traditional windowing pattern.
“Every film requires careful consideration to determine the best release strategy to serve the consumer and maximize revenue across all platforms.”
Partnering with retailers also is key, Buchi says. “I admire how our leading retailers continue to strive for innovation, new growth opportunities, efficiencies, and paradigm shifts, all of which can lead to exciting developments we’ll see tested in 2023 and beyond,” he says. “We plan to explore a reimagining of headless commerce (a separation of the front end and back end of an e-commerce application) for both physical and digital retailers, the evolution of NFT-bundling with premium products and experience for the super fan, and podcast product extensions for our beloved franchises.”
Retailers believe consumers will become increasingly value-conscious amid the cloudy economic forecast.
“There will continue to be multiple modes of entertainment consumption in 2023,” says Cameron Douglas, VP of home entertainment for Vudu and Fandango. “However, we expect that consumers will be more value-conscious. Do we still need this subscription service, or should I upgrade/downgrade/eliminate? Can we tolerate a few ads in this casual viewing experience? Should we buy this, or should we just rent it? Should we splurge on a family night out at the movie theater or wait and watch the film at home in the premium window? Tools like Rotten Tomatoes will become even more valuable, not only to validate fans’ entertainment choices, but to help people find value in what to watch next.”
Garson Foos
Garson Foos, CEO of Shout! Factory, a leading independent film distributor, says 2023 “looks to continue Shout’s growth in the transactional space with theatrical new releases, major new anime features and name-brand catalog coming to market. We’re extremely happy that the transactional business has remained so strong. We continue to make numerous deals for physical and TVOD rights — physical with studios and indies, and TVOD with indies. The 4K format is creating a lot of opportunity as we continue to find new ways to engage passionate fans. As there are more strong titles available to stream, it puts pressure on the transactional business. But there’s always the customer that will pay to have the best version of something, and to stream it without commercials, or own it digitally.”
The subscription streaming side of the business, which according to the latest estimates from DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group now accounts for nearly 85% of consumer home entertainment, is expected to see continued turbulence in 2023, thanks to such obstacles as high content prices, fierce competition among services, a maturing market and, until just recently, a reliance solely on consumer subscriptions for revenue.
Bill Rouhana
“SVOD will continue its challenges as consumers cancel subscriptions or move to lower-cost ad-supported tiers, which may exacerbate the hemorrhaging of cash,” says Bill Rouhana, CEO of Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment. “You’ll see a consolidation of the industry as smaller SVOD players fade, and even larger players begin looking to be sold or merged.”
Veteran ad-supported streaming services such as Chicken Soup, Rouhana maintains, are in the right place at the right time.
“AVOD is soaring because consumers are growing tired of paying for so many SVODs,” he says. “Given the state of the economy and uncertain times, they are cutting back. To supplement their streaming diet, they’re seeking free options, and AVOD services are benefiting from this. I think you’ll see even greater growth in 2023.”
As for his own company, Rouhana says Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment “will continue to scale across AVOD, FAST and our Screen Media original content studio. It will be a big year for AVOD and FAST as consumers continue to discover the amazing content available for free — especially as the economy continues in a recession.
“I also see more companies getting into AVOD — which further reinforces our strategy and what we already know. As Netflix and Disney ramp up their ad-supported tiers, they will begin charging higher CPMs which will benefit us. That will also help our ad rep business as we help smaller AVODs sell their ad inventory — something they can’t do on their own at the same level of success.”
Stefan Van Engen
Stefan Van Engen, SVOD of content programming and partnerships at Xumo, a premium FAST (free ad-supported television) service, shares Rouhana’s optimism.
“For Xumo, we will continue to scale and deliver premium experiences across our FAST platform, Xumo Play, and the roll out of new Xumo devices,” he says. “The industry as a whole will continue to innovate around engagement, programming and more personalized experiences.
“I believe entertainment is supposed to be easy. With the amount of amazing choices across SVOD services, the fatigue is not in streaming, it’s in choosing and cost. AVOD and FAST continues to soar because it takes the economic risk out of just watching something, without having to think about where and what you are choosing to watch.”
Amy Jo Smith, president and CEO of trade association DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group, says that in the coming year, “it will be more apparent than ever how much consumers value choice and a seamless user experience. Viewers will continue to seek a wider breadth of content, including sports and live events, delivered through major and specialty services, and they will look for cost-efficient, customized, and easily navigable bundles of entertainment options, including experiences that are transactional, subscription, ad-supported and possibly even theatrical, social and immersive.”
“Short lived will be the days where consumer entertainment is primarily developed and distributed by a community of monolithic giants centered in Hollywood run and operated by people who look like me,” adds Mark Fisher, president and CEO of OTT.X, the streaming trade association. “We will continue to move forward toward a more egalitarian, global and diverse ecosystem.”
DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group announced the winners of its second annual TechOps Awards at a ceremony in Los Angeles Oct. 12. The event was the first live awards celebration, following last year’s virtual ceremony, and drew nearly 200 people to the DTS Sound Stage on Wilshire Boulevard’s famed “Miracle Mile.”
The U.K. home entertainment market is predicted to grow to £5.5 billion ($6 billion) in consumer spending over the next three years (2025), which includes £2.4 ($2.8 billion) spent on movie sales transactions.
That’s according to a new report, released Sept. 23, from The British Association for Screen Entertainment (BASE) and DEGI: The Digital Entertainment Group International (formerly DEG Europe).
The U.K. home entertainment sector was worth £3.3 billion ($3.6 billion) in 2020, and £3.7 billion ($4 billion) in 2021.
In the new report, The Evolution of Home Entertainment Report 2020 – 2025, BASE and DEGI maintain the revenue growth reflects a rise of 114% on pre-pandemic predictions and underscores category optimism showcasing the potential of multiple entertainment formats, distribution channels and access to more than 75,000 transactional titles.
“The evolution of home entertainment is in full force … where transactional formats expand to embrace premium VOD, SVOD embraces AVOD, joined by FAST, all offering consumer choice and taking a share of growing consumer engagement,” Liz Bales, CEO of BASE and DEGI, said in a statement.
Citing additional insights from Ampere Analysis, Futuresource Consulting, Kantar, the British Screen Forum, Digital Entertainment Group and The Digital Entertainment & Retail Association, Official Charts Company, the Intellectual Property Office, and Amy Jo Smith, president/CEO of DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group, among other sources, the report contends that as consumers re-emerge from the pandemic, so too will the release of new movies and subsequent consumer spending across retail and rental channels.
“The U.S. market continues to be the starting point for much of the change that is flowing into home entertainment markets around the world, and DEG members now span the globe,” Smith wrote in the report. “As we extend our global reach, closer collaboration with DEG International to align messaging and provide communication support for members in multiple regions and territories is paramount.”
Craig Armer, strategic insight director (entertainment) at Kantar, found that 35.1% of consumers in the U.K. visited the cinema at least once in the 52-week period through June 26, 2022, compared with 46.2% in the same period in 2019, equating to a drop of 24%. This downward trend then impacted the home entertainment market through a 40% drop to 5.1 million U.K. consumers renting or buying movies, compared with nine million home entertainment consumers in 2019.
“Expect this [trend] to bounce back over the next few years as the flow of new content becomes more consistent, possibly attracting as many as two million additional shoppers back into home entertainment,” Armer wrote.
At the same time, the dearth of new releases continues to spike VOD transactions for catalog titles.
“VOD is the largest source of catalog consumers, with 3.6 million more renters vs. pre-pandemic times,” Armer wrote.
The analyst added that packaged media, notably DVD, remains a cost-effective distribution channel for consumers. Specifically, the retail price of a new movie on DVD is virtually unchanged over the past nine years. Indeed, James Bond fans buying the 2012 release of Skyfall at £9.99 ($10.90) on DVD would also be able to find the 2021 release No Time to Die at the same price.
“Maintaining a strong visible presence for disc in physical retail, and continuing the drive for digital adoption, will ensure the industry navigates challenging economic circumstances whilst recovering from the disruption of the last few years,” Armer wrote.
DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group on Aug. 12 unveiled its new board of directors, with Paramount Global chief content licensing officer Dan Cohen elected chair and prior chair Jim Wuthrich, president of content distribution at Warner Bros. Discovery, moving to chair emeritus.
Jonathan Zepp
Jonathan Zepp, head of media and entertainment global partnerships at Google, is the home entertainment trade association’s new vice chair.
DEG is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year and says it aims to drive membership “that reflects the diverse, global and fluid digital entertainment marketplace.”
The new officers of the DEG board were elected to two-year terms and will serve through July 2024.
Andrea Downing, president of PBS Distribution, returns as CFO, with Rick Hack, head of media and entertainment partnerships at Intel Corp., re-elected secretary.
Returning DEG member Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) and Amazon Web Services (AWS), a new DEG member company, are each represented with new DEG board directors: Jason Spivak, EVP of distribution for North America at SPE, and Chris Blandy, global leader of strategy and business development, media and entertainment at AWS.
Andrea Downing
A+E Networks and Fandango/Vudu are longstanding members returning to the board. They are represented, respectively, by Mark Garner, EVP of content licensing and business development, and Mark Young, SVP of strategy, business and corporate development for Fandango and Vudu and GM of Rotten Tomatoes.
The new DEG board also includes two seats representing DEG’s two alliances, the D2C Alliance (D2CA) and the Advanced Content Delivery Alliance (ACDA), which the trade group says “play increasingly important roles in focusing DEG membership for the future and broadening the organization’s membership.”
The D2CA director is Adam Lewinson of Tubi. The ACDA director is Bill Neighbors of Xperi Holding Corp. Both Lewinson and Neighbors serve as chief content officer of their respective companies.
DEG directors also appointed Robin Tarufelli of Deloitte as a special board advisor for the 2022-23 term, a role “intended to provide diversity of input from membership sectors and companies that might not otherwise be represented on the board,” the DEG announced.
DEG arrives at its quarter-century mark with an expanding global membership that includes 81 member companies encompassing all areas of digital entertainment, with diverse business segments and from a wide range of geographical locations. Examples include Israel’s Deepdub, a localization service provider; Argentina’s BB Media, a data science company specializing in media and entertainment; South Korea’s Blintn, a global content marketplace; and U.S.-based TreeTrunk, which introduces a new standard for NFTs that enables blockchain royalty collection and distribution.
“I’m delighted that DEG membership is evolving to reflect the increasingly global nature of the digital entertainment ecosystem,” new board chair Cohen said in a statement. “The new board is committed to serving all DEG members and to providing the membership even more opportunities for collaboration, education and networking across industry sectors and across borders.”
“We welcome all of our new DEG board directors and are thrilled about our expanding base of companies based outside the U.S.,” said Amy Jo Smith, DEG president and CEO. “I’m grateful that they see the value of membership in DEG, which is committed to continuing to deliver high return on investment for members evolving into global providers of direct-to-consumer entertainment.”
As the digital entertainment business celebrates 25 years, so does DEG.
DEG was there at the beginning, and I with it, when the DVD Video Group was formed in 1997 with the express purpose of promoting the first digital entertainment format — DVD — in collaboration with content owners and hardware makers.
I have so many fond memories and proud moments. Among the proudest was the formation of DEG Japan, where senior Japanese executives met under the guise of the DEG brand for meaningful dialog and to see what worked in their market. They were so self-guided; it was really inspiring to see. And, more recently, the creation of the Hedy Lamarr Awards to honor women making strides in entertainment and technology, an initiative championed by Marc Finer, who has worked side by side with me at DEG since day one.
I share these thoughts and a few more of my personal touchstones in an effort to focus not so much on the business details as on the business “flavor.” And that flavor is pioneering, revolutionary, one of art pushed forward by technology, and of a team bonded by common goals and shared experience.
DVD
Warren Lieberfarb
Warren Lieberfarb, the Warner Home Video president known far and wide as the “Father of DVD,” had the vision of putting a movie on a CD, named it DVD and, with no small amount of chutzpah, assured everyone that consumers would buy and collect movies going forward. I had been in many meetings with Warren, but it wasn’t until I heard him convince a room packed with naysayers at CES 1998 that I finally understood: Warren was a force of nature, and he was going to make it happen. DVD was the most significant disruption the entertainment industry had experienced, and it became the fastest selling consumer electronics product in history.
DVD-Audio
DEG helped launch DVD-Audio at the music industry trade show NARM in San Antonio in 2000. It was amazing to see the jaws of both music enthusiasts and experts drop when they heard classics like Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors or Joni Mitchell’s Both Sides Now. It was music they had heard countless times, but now they were hearing it differently. It came alive. DVD-Audio’s quality notwithstanding, digital won the race in the music business and DVD-Audio was a casualty as a mainstream format.
You’ve Got Mail
Over the years, DEG helped promote many popular titles when they came out on DVD and Blu-ray Disc. One of my favorites was a promotion we did for Warner Home Video’s launch of You’ve Got Mail in New York City, where we passed out daisies in Central Park. My now-husband Jeff walked by and got some flowers. When we actually met two years later, we realized that our first encounter was me giving him daisies in the park!
DEG Bags
DEG quickly became known for its coveted bags we’d give away at events, particularly the DEG Annual Reception at CES. The bags were stuffed with dozens of DVDs, then Blu-rays, plus lots of other fun branded items. I have many memories of the bags, but my favorites are receiving counterfeit bag tickets from attendees trying to score extra bags; walking through Heathrow Airport and seeing an executive from Paramount using the bag (pictured); and visiting the old city in Jerusalem and spying an executive’s teenage son using the DEG backpack!
Emiel Petrone
Emiel Petrone
As DEG chair, Disney’s Bob Chapek asked the Board of Directors to attend CEDIA, the trade show where the coolest home entertainment technologies of the time were displayed. Everyone agreed and found it a meaningful visit, punctuated by a VIP tour of show of the floor by DEG’s technical director, Marc Finer (known to most as “Finer”). Our founding chair, Emiel Petrone of Philips, led an after-dinner run to White Castle for burgers, which became a DEG tradition at CEDIA, despite seeming like a better idea in the moment than it ever did the next morning. After Emiel passed away in 2004, Bob picked up the mantle and rallied us all to continue the CEDIA midnight White Castle run in Emiel’s honor.
9/11
(Photo courtesy Wiki Commons)
DEG was holding a meeting at Giant Interactive in New York when the attacks of 9/11 happened. We watched in horror as we realized our colleague John Beug from Warner Music lost his wife and mother-in-law in one of the planes. They would turn out to be among 3,000 others who perished that day. Stranded in New York City, I spent the next few days with DEG colleagues. We were all there for each other, giving support. Every year since, Jeff Stabenau of Giant, Gene Kelsey (then of Panasonic), Leslie Cohen (then of Sony Music), Paul Bishow (then of Universal Music Group) and I connect on Sept. 11 to honor the memory of others.
4K
DEG established DEG Japan as a means of flowing more information of emerging technologies to the membership. Attending DEG Japan’s annual meeting and Blu-ray Prize celebration was always a highlight. It’s been a pleasure to know and work with Tsukagoshi-san, formerly of Disney, and many others. Each trip was punctuated with a visit to Sony worldwide headquarters to visit their lab. I’ll never forget the moment they showed me 4K in their state-of-the-art theater. Colors and images came alive in a way I’d never imagined.
Board leadership
Over these 25 years, one thing that always strikes me is how the Board leaders, all executives with demanding day jobs, took the time to guide the organization, knowing that doing so would help grow the industry and, in turn, grow their businesses. I’m blessed that they all took the time to mentor and lead me, and that I may call each a friend, not just a colleague. DEG would not be marking 25 years in 2022 if it hadn’t been for their vision and leadership.
Amy Jo Smith is president and CEO of DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group, the leading home entertainment trade association and the descendant of the DVD Video Group, formed in 1997 to promote DVD.
As president and CEO of DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group, Amy Jo Smith heads the leading trade group for the home entertainment industry, representing the interests of the world’s largest media and entertainment companies, consumer electronics manufacturers, platform providers and technology companies.
A former White House communications advisor, Smith since 1997 has led the industry-funded group’s efforts to enhance and promote home entertainment during its evolution from videocassettes to DVDs, Blu-ray Discs and today’s digital age.
Under Smith’s leadership, the DEG is credited with helping to make DVD the fastest-growing consumer electronics product in industry history. In 2019, the DEG launched the D2C Alliance Council as a working community within the DEG to represent the global direct-to-consumer media industry and support its members to help create a robust marketplace to lead the new era of content consumption.
Media Play News asked Smith about the achievements, continuing work and aims of the DEG.
MPN: On the eve of the association’s 25th anniversary, tell us about DEG’s mission and how it has evolved with the industry.
Smith: The DEG’s first mission was to support the product launch of the DVD format. At the time, we were focused on attracting industry support and consumer adoption of the format. Many credit the DEG’s efforts with being a catalyst for DVD’s success as the fastest-growing product in consumer electronics history.
As consumer interest for physical and digital entertainment has evolved, so has the DEG. We are here to serve the industry in helping to improve the consumer experience with the various ways they consume entertainment content in 2022 and beyond.
MPN: What do you consider the group’s three major accomplishments?
Smith: The DEG aims to create a unique, collaborative environment to enable leading content, delivery, device and technology companies to work together to grow the category. Our goal is to help leading media and entertainment companies make informed decisions to grow their businesses. Here are just a few of these:
The DEG spearheaded the industry’s efforts for a unified approach in designing and displaying new packaged media and consumer messaging, as witnessed by 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray, Digital Copy and Digital Download.
The DEG has led numerous consumer research projects to help demystify the benefits associated with new digital experiences. Some examples include the industry’s first research on the prospects for home 3D, digital collecting and, most recently, the study commissioned by the DEG’s D2C Alliance Targeted Services committee from SmithGeiger to inform on streaming user behavior related to targeted SVOD and AVOD services.
More than two decades ago, the DEG was established to support the launch of DVD. This helped to unify a number of fragmented marketing efforts into a single, powerful voice and was largely responsible for the format becoming arguably the most successful entertainment platform in history.
But the DEG’s proudest accomplishment is its ability to adjust to the changing dynamics of the industry to support member companies in their efforts to grow the industry and improve content delivery to fans.
MPN: How has the pandemic changed the way DEG relates to and serves its members?
Smith: With members unable to travel and commute to business meetings, we’ve been able to assemble executives more quickly. This has allowed us to move projects and activities faster. The DEG was quick to launch its virtual Expos, curated video sessions highlighting relevant topics. The Expos were received so favorably, attended by nearly 200 executives representing 50 companies on average in 2021, encouraging staff to produce these events about every six weeks. Our Expo on localization even resulted in the formation of our Advanced Content Delivery Alliance (ACDA) localization committee, which is now focusing on the need for a standard definition of quality across the localization industry.
The DEG has always been a high-touch organization, providing customized customer care to meet varying needs. We brought this to the forefront of what we do during the pandemic. Members have told us how much this meant to them, to be able to count on us to bring pressing issues into committees, surging trends to Expos and to make introductions to enable networking in a WFH environment.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge Marcy Magiera, Andi Elliott and Jean Levicki on our team, who have been key to our success here. Everyone has worked tirelessly while navigating their own pandemic challenges.
MPN: There are now two major “Alliances” within the DEG — the Direct-to-Consumer Alliance (D2CA) and the Advanced Content Delivery Alliance (ACDA). How are these different from one another? How do they serve the members differently than the core DEG?
Smith: The D2C Alliance was established nearly three years ago to put a focus on companies with a direct-to-consumer offering. We wanted to shift the conversation away from the “streaming wars” and emphasize the burgeoning business opportunities available and exciting ways for consumers to get their TV, filmed, news, sports and specialty content.
About a year ago, we analyzed our membership. Originally a content owner-based organization, we had a surge of member companies with products and services that help bring the content to market. We brought their voices to the forefront with the creation of the Advanced Content Delivery Alliance. In ACDA, members explore new ways to improve delivery of content. We are incredibly excited about the enthusiastic and worthwhile discussions and projects taking place in the Alliance. Through its Supply Chain Efficiency and Security committee, for example, the Alliance seeks to address obstructions within workflows due to the narrowing of windows, additional post work required for the home entertainment window, security challenges, and the threat landscape brought on by pirates.
These Alliances allow the DEG to put a spotlight on pressing issues that members are focused on. We’re pleased with the support and participation we’ve received from members who are joining committees and giving input on agenda items we can tackle as an industry.
MPN: There was no annual DEG reception at CES in Las Vegas this year. When can the industry look forward to that event again?
Smith: There is going to be a DEG annual reception! Our annual reception will take place May 3 in Los Angeles at Skirball Cultural Center as part of our inaugural EnTech Fest. Members have been asking us for years to move the annual reception to Los Angeles so that it’s more accessible to L.A.-based folks.
Our EnTech Fest is a B2B event on May 3 and 4 built around what’s new and what’s next in content distribution and display technology. This forum will allow companies with products and services that enable distribution of content to showcase their latest offerings. EnTech will be different from other events in that we are focusing specifically on products for entertainment distribution.
EnTech Fest will also have a special section dedicated to start-ups. Start Up Alley, as we’re calling it, will allow embryonic companies the chance to get in front of leading entertainment and technology companies.
We’re excited that companies including Blu Digital Group, Dolby, DTS, Google TV, Intel, Looper Insights, NBCUniversal, NPD Group, Paramount, Synamedia and WarnerMedia are already supporting EnTech and, in some cases, Start Up Alley specifically.
And, yes, EnTech will also be special because our annual reception will be held at that time!
MPN: And now tell us the Amy Jo story — how did you get involved in the DEG, and why?
Smith: Prior to DVD’s format launch, I was introduced to Warren Lieberfarb, the “father of DVD.” Warren tapped me to lead the consortium to support the global launch of the disc format for two to three years. As Warren described it, if we’re successful, there won’t be a need for the DEG any longer. And, if we’re not successful, there won’t be a need for the DEG, either.
The way in which we’ve been able to constantly adjust our agenda to best meet the needs of the industry is what I’m most proud of. There are many DEG board leaders who have been instrumental in this. Our hats off to Bob Chapek, Ron Sanders, Mike Dunn, Mike Fasulo and Eddie Cunningham, to name a few. And our current board directors who have been instrumental in steering the DEG during the pandemic, including Jim Wuthrich, Dan Cohen, Matt Strauss, Andrea Downing, Rick Hack and Bob Buchi.
The DEG is only as good as the people who participate in it to make it so. The organization is strong because of all the smart, forward-thinking executives who lean into the DEG. We are happy to know they rely on the DEG to be their organization to support the many emerging ways to deliver content. I’m proud to be part of the DEG family. Our thanks to the many collaborative partnerships we have in the industry, including MPN.
NEWS ANALYSIS — The shadow of COVID-19 continued to hang over 2021, despite rosy predictions the previous summer that the worst would soon be over.
By mid-year, with a vaccine rollout in full swing, most restrictions were lifted and theaters were welcoming back moviegoers, particularly after studios once again began stepping up movie production. This theatrical recovery continued, unchecked, through the emergence of the summer Delta variant and the beginning of the winter Omicron surge. Indeed, the December 2021 theatrical opening of Spider-Man: No Way Home generated $260 million in domestic ticket sales, the second-highest North American box office opening. Domestic box office revenue for 2021 is estimated at $4.5 billion, more than twice what it generated in 2020 but still down 61% from 2019, the last year before the virus hit.
Meanwhile, the entertainment world in 2021 was rocked by two major announcements: Amazon bought a movie studio, MGM, for $8.45 billion, and AT&T announced plans to spin-off WarnerMedia through a merger with Discovery, resulting in a new media powerhouse, Warner Bros. Discovery, under Discovery Inc.’s CEO David Zaslav. The deal, approved by the European Commission in December, is expected to be completed in mid-2022, pending Discovery shareholder and federal regulatory approval.
Sadly, the year ended on a down note, with Omicron leading to theater closures in Europe and the cancellation or postponement of several key entertainment-industry events, including The Critics Choice Awards, the National Board of Review’s annual gala, the Palm Springs Film Festival, and BAFTA Los Angeles’ annual tea party for the awards season.
The year also saw the vindication of WarnerMedia’s controversial plan, announced at the end of the prior year, to release its entire theatrical slate simultaneously on its HBO Max streaming service. Initially railed against as a death blow to the movie business, the strategy in retrospect kept the business alive, providing a steady stream of high-profile new product to movie theaters hungry for fresh films, even if they no longer would be exclusive to the big screen.
Jim Wuthrich
“2021 marked the first anniversary of HBO Max and, with it, a whole new distribution pattern for movies,” said Jim Wuthrich, president of content distribution for WarnerMedia. “Due to the pandemic and uncertainty of closures, WarnerMedia made all of its movies available on HBO Max and in theaters at the same time. This was great for movie fans, as they could watch movies such as Wonder Woman 1984 or Godzilla vs. Kong at home or in theaters.”
Mixed Results
On the home entertainment front, 2021 was the proverbial mixed bag for the industry’s two segments, subscription streaming and transactional/physical.
The first few months of 2021 were clouded in uncertainty, as the winter surge of the virus delayed the reopening of movie theaters well into the spring. Studios held back their big releases until their opening strategy — theaters, PVOD or both — could be determined.
Streaming, not surprisingly, continued to flourish at the accelerated pace that began a year earlier with the onset of the pandemic. Consumer spending on subscription video-on-demand services soared more than 20% in the first half, according to DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group estimates — and those numbers don’t include Amazon Prime Video, which is considered in the same league as Netflix.
Amy Jo Smith
“The growth in subscription streaming in 2021 can be attributed to consumers who continued to spend time at home, increasing their engagement with content offered through an abundance of new direct-to-consumer subscription services, including Disney+, HBO Max, Paramount+, Peacock, AMC+ and many others,” said Amy Jo Smith, DEG president and CEO. “These services provide consumers premium content with convenience and value.”
Disc and digital sales of movies in the first half of 2021, meanwhile, were off by more than 25% from the prior year, while combined disc and digital rental (TVOD) revenue suffered a first-half decline of more than 30%, according to estimates prepared by DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group.
TVOD Recovers
As the year progressed, subscription streaming continued to clearly dominate home entertainment, even as the transactional side of the business began to recover in the wake of theatrical reopenings that remained on track despite the summer emergence of the more contagious Delta variant. Final year-end DEG numbers are not yet in, but by the third quarter disc and digital sales had trimmed their quarterly decline to 12% while rentals were off just 14%.
“Factors limiting transactional growth in 2021 include few new theatrical releases, which are historically a key driver of home entertainment spending,” Smith said. ”This was particularly true early in the year. Spending on library titles, however, has been notably strong throughout the pandemic, and with theatrical new releases restarting mid-year, we saw spending on home purchases of new releases beginning to pick up in the third quarter. We expect to see this trend continuing when the full year is tallied.”
“Looking back at the year, 2021 certainly had its challenges, but there were some high notes as well for our business,” notes Jason Spivak, EVP of distribution for North American Television & Home Entertainment at Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Jason Spivak
“Early in the year, we were blown away by the tremendous success of Monster Hunter on both physical and digital formats. We achieved strong PVOD results on The Father and Don’t Breathe 2. And throughout the year we saw consistent strength in our digital catalog, particularly our drafting efforts around the ‘Spider-Man’ franchise.
“The biggest highlight for our business, however, has been the fourth-quarter theatrical performances of Venom: Let There Be Carnage, Ghostbusters: Afterlife and, of course, the worldwide phenomenon that is Spider-Man: No Way Home. These films demonstrate that consumers are excited to return to theaters and that they crave the communal experience that can only be achieved in a movie theater.”
WarnerMedia’s Jim Wuthrich said his company’s strategy of releasing its news films to theaters and streaming on the same day “did add an element of unpredictability to [traditional, transactional] home entertainment in forecasting demand, as it was unique to have streaming as the first window.” Ultimately, he said, “we found that there is robust demand for transactional (EST/TVOD/physical), despite the change in windowing.”
Bob Buchi
Bob Buchi, president of Paramount Home Entertainment, said that while 2021 “certainly did not go as planned, consumers again turned to home entertainment options in record numbers. Throughout the year’s unprecedented circumstances, Paramount continued to experiment with new release windowing, maximized the power of our exceptional library, and supported the ongoing growth of Paramount+.”
With very different release strategies, Buchi added, A Quiet Place Part II, Snake Eyes and Paw Patrol: The Movie “delivered tremendous results across each studio window thanks to the cumulative marketing muscle and cross-company promotional efforts, which bodes well for the ongoing coexistence of every platform.”
Paramount also saw consumer spending on catalog titles remain strong, “representing nearly 60% of annual revenue and holding steady to slightly up compared to the extraordinary sales in 2020 across physical and digital worldwide,” Buchi said. “Digital sales, in particular, have been exceptionally strong during the pandemic, with a compounded annual growth rate of over 25% compared to pre-pandemic 2019 levels globally.”
Paramount also scored with the 40th anniversary of the “Indiana Jones” franchise with the first 4K Ultra HD release of the films on both disc and digital platforms, Buchi noted. “And on the television front, home entertainment consumers continue to flock to ‘Yellowstone,’ with nearly 3 million digital transactions for season four, which launched in November.”
Michael Bonner
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment president Michael Bonner said that while 2021 “remained unpredictable and challenging on several fronts … consumers’ engagement with content has never been stronger. During these unprecedented times, the studios have served audiences well by embracing unconventional release patterns and new business models giving consumers more ways to access and enjoy movies.”
Bonner added that “engagement is up, and it’s happening across various services and business models. For Universal, our new release home entertainment business remained very strong in 2021 as we saw with F9, The Croods: A New Age, Let Him Go, Promising Young Woman and several others, with a significant contribution coming from our new PVOD window and followed by our traditional home entertainment offering. On top of that, similar to 2020, we saw our library business reaching historical levels.”
Distribution Deals
On the physical side of the business, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment and Lionsgate in February 2021 announced a multiyear agreement in which Sony will handle distribution of Lionsgate’s DVD/Blu-ray Disc releases in the U.S. and Canada beginning in July. Lionsgate’s North American packaged-media distribution had been handled by the former 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, which was acquired in 2019 by Disney.
Lionsgate continues to maintain its own independent sales and marketing teams, but is leveraging SPHE’s supply chain and distribution services. At the time Sony’s Jason Spivak said, “By working together, we can identify and leverage efficiencies in the supply chain that will benefit not only our respective studios, but also retailers and, ultimately, the millions of consumers who enjoy Sony Pictures and Lionsgate feature films and TV programs in the 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD formats.”
Two months after the Sony-Lionsgate deal was announced came the official launch of Studio Distribution Services (SDS), a joint venture between Warner Bros. Home Entertainment and Universal Pictures Home Entertainment to distribute packaged media in the United States and Canada.
“Starting any business in a pandemic is challenging, but one that relies on delivering physical goods to stores across two countries during a supply chain upheaval is not for the faint of heart,” WarnerMedia’s Wuthrich said. “The SDS team, along with the studios, did a great job managing through a challenging time.”
Eddie Cunningham, the former Universal Pictures Home Entertainment president who was tapped to run SDS, told Media Play News earlier in the year, “We, with our many supply chain partners in manufacturing, distribution and freight, are doing everything in our power to mitigate those pressure points.
“Sometimes meeting delivery dates and keeping retail on-shelf availability at our usual high industry standards has been difficult. It is a huge focus across our company and everything in supply chain that we used to check weekly is now daily, and everything we did daily is almost hourly, as we constantly re-assess priorities.”
Streaming Fatigue and the Rise of AVOD
While disc sales continue to be a priority for the big Hollywood studios, along with digital movie sales and rentals, streaming clearly remains the dominant force in home entertainment. As of the end of the third quarter, streaming accounted for nearly 80% of total consumer spending this year on home entertainment, or $18.6 billion. Total consumer spending on disc and digital sales and rentals in the first nine months of the year was just $5 billion.
And yet subscription streaming did face several challenges, including consumer fatigue — stemming largely from the rising costs of subscribing to multiple services — and rapid gains in free ad-supported platforms such as Pluto and Tubi. In professional consultancy Deloitte’s 2021 Digital Media Survey, more than half of the respondents said they are re-evaluating multiple streaming subscriptions, and 40% said they planned on terminating at least one subscription. Adriana Waterston, SVP of insights and strategy at Horowitz, told Media Play News in November that streamers are feeling overwhelmed by the proliferation of services, with many struggling to figure out what to watch, and where.
In December, a TVision survey found that time spent on subscription video-on-demand platforms decreased 8.6% from the first quarter to the third quarter of 2021, while time spent on ad-supported VOD increased 9.3%. It should be noted that the SVOD decline may be due, at least in part, to the vaccine rollout and people once again venturing out into the world, while AVOD growth includes not just SVOD dropouts but also linear TV audiences. Regardless, speaking in December at an OTT.X conference, Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia said the FAST/AVOD business is projected to reach $4 billion by 2024.
Mark Fisher
Mark Fisher, president and CEO of OTT.X, the trade association for streamers, said free ad-supported streaming is just one more option that is leading to continued growth for the overall home entertainment business.
“Internet-based delivery today gives the consumer so many more opportunities and more choices to enjoy great content — both on demand and linear,” he said. “Some prefer long-form, some short-form; some prefer to watch without ads, while others watch ads to avoid paying; some like to watch what they want, when they want, while others like the sit-back FAST experience; some want to build their cloud-based collections and others just want to watch once; some like to watch big-budget spectacles and other enjoy good indie-produced stories; and many are adding the diversity of international content and niche content and channels. Opportunity and choice benefit everybody.”
He’s got a point. Overall, the home entertainment business is on track for another record year. The DEG’s estimate of $23.6 billion in total consumer spending in the first nine months of this year is up 6.3% from the spending total at this same point in 2020.
Converging Businesses
And the two sectors of the business, streaming and transactional, are converging.
One of best examples of this is that while Redbox’s legacy disc-rental kiosks remain the company’s cash cow, a massive digital transformation — fueled by the company going public in October — is expanding the Redbox brand into digital, with a particular emphasis on streaming. Redbox Free Live TV, an ad-supported streaming service that launched in February 2020, now has more than 100 channels offering viewers free access to movies and television shows, news, and lifestyle and sports entertainment programming. In December, Redbox began advertising its digital products on its kiosks.
Galen Smith
Asked how Redbox fared in 2021, CEO Galen Smith said that on the kiosk and TVOD side, “ We continued to see a significant impact on the quantity of new release movies due to production being paused as a result of COVID, with fewer movies in 2021 than 2020. The good news is we anticipate the number of new theatrical movies releasing in 2022 should be back to levels not seen since 2019.”
As for streaming, he said, “2021 was a growth year for us — as we rapidly scaled both our AVOD service and FAST channels.”
Redbox going public, Smith noted, “provided us with additional capital to invest in the ongoing digital transformation of Redbox, as we built on our transactional video-on-demand service with growth in AVOD (more than 5,000 titles on demand) and FAST (more than 125 linear channels including five that are Redbox branded) and a subscription channels business coming in 2022.”
On the Indie Front
Independent film distributors, meanwhile, are finding the plethora of streaming services a whole new market for their films, augmenting their traditional TVOD and physical release.
“It’s always a good thing when new channels appear where we can license our films,” said Joe Amodei, president and CEO of Virgil Films & Entertainment. “The major accounts still rule in this area, but as they have dwindled down their buying in favor of original films and series we’ve enjoyed doing business with this new group of folks. It’s great.”
Indies also say they are finding their disc businesses remarkably resilient. Ed Seaman, COO of MVD Entertainment, said 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray “continues to surprise us. Sales are really strong, possibly because there aren’t a ton of products in this space, but mainly because our trade partners/content providers are choosing excellent content and do a great job lovingly restoring and filling these editions with great bells and whistles.
“Compared to last year, 2021 was far more stable. We knew we were in a pandemic and we didn’t have the fear of the unknown like last year, where we didn’t know what impact a lockdown would have on our business and our customers. We learned in 2020 that when everyone is stuck at home during a pandemic, home entertainment products and services are pretty popular. We were able to execute our plans with greater confidence in 2021 that the market was not going to fall apart, and we had a really strong year as a result.”
John Rotella
John Rotella, SVP for Shout! Factory, said the company saw “unbelievable growth in catalog and new-release sales” during the pandemic year of 2020, “and that swell carried forward into 2021.”
Shout! Factory, he said, “saw one of our best years ever on gross shipments and an equally impressive net business. We also saw growth in POS revenue in 2021. The DVD and Steelbook/4K business grew again as Blu-ray sales stayed even compared to 2020. New-release and catalog as a whole all improved from a surprising and productive year, led by our new Western, Old Henry, and 4K ‘Halloween’ releases.”
Some of this success, Rotella said, “can also be attributed to a less competitive new-release marketplace, upgraded and repackaged catalog, developing more valuable collectable products at a higher price and managing the right genre that works for mass [merchants]. Walmart and Amazon continue to offer new-release and catalog opportunities, and we saw an e-commerce surge in business. Looking back, 2021 unexpectedly managed to match 2020 in POS and shipments and remained far superior to 2019 in every area.”
On the downside, the supply chain crisis has compounded ongoing problems with limited replication opportunities, resulting in delays in bringing product to market.
“We were hugely affected by inbound transportation challenges, mostly from the U.K. and Europe, where many of our top clients reside,” MVD’s Seaman said. The situation improved toward the end of the year, he said. “I doubt the Omicron strain will cause lockdowns again, and I’m keeping my fingers are crossed that the labor challenges at the border are mostly conquered,” he said.
New Ways of Doing Things
Another home entertainment trend that continued in 2021 is the consolidation of theatrical and home entertainment teams. Warner Bros., Sony Pictures and Lionsgate went through their respective integrations in 2020; Paramount Pictures followed in March 2021 with a restructuring that led to the exit of 23 home entertainment marketing and distribution personnel, including marketing chief Vincent Marcais, respected publicity head Brenda Ciccone, and Dina Marovich, SVP of worldwide media and interactive marketing.
A new way of doing things sometimes finds home entertainment executives branching out beyond their wheelhouses.
“Somewhat out of the traditional course of business, our team successfully managed the launch of Virtual Reality experiences at the new Harry Potter store in New York City,” Warner’s Wuthrich said. “These two experiences allow Potter fans the ultimate experience of visiting Hogwarts or flying high above London on broomsticks while battling Death Eaters. The experiences have sold out since launching this summer and have been garnering rave reviews. We look forward to expanding the number of locations in 2022 so more Potter fans will have a chance to live the experience.”
DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group is entering its 25th year with an influx of new members, the trade group announced Dec. 2.
The newest DEG members include Altman Solon, Anuvu, BIGtoken, Guts + Data, IRIS.TV, NAGRA, Omdia, Plex, Synamedia, TiVo, Visual Data Media Services, Vobile and ZOO Digital. Spherex also returned as a member of DEG, bringing the number of new DEG member companies to 26 so far in 2021 (a total that includes 12 new members announced at the end of the first quarter).
DEG’s Direct-to-Consumer Alliance (D2CA), created in 2019, and Advanced Content Delivery Alliance (ACDA), new this year, play an increasingly important role in focusing DEG membership for the future and attracting new members across a broad swath of the digital entertainment industry, according to the trade group.
“DEG’s wide reach across content creators, retailers, platforms and strategic vendors is an important part of its value to members, bringing companies in different industry segments together to work within DEG to advance industry positions and meet common goals,” said DEG chair Jim Wuthrich, president of content distribution for WarnerMedia. “The D2C Alliance and the Advanced Content Delivery Alliance are the latest examples of this community building, and I’m thrilled that so many new members see the value in DEG. I’m happy to welcome all of the new member companies to the DEG community.”
The new ACDA within DEG addresses advancements in technology to enable more and improved content delivery. ACDA member companies are aligned in committees addressing localization, supply chain efficiencies and security, cloud/edge computing and 5G.
The D2C Alliance represents the global direct-to-consumer media industry and supports its members to help create a robust marketplace to lead the new era of content consumption.
“We are thrilled about the expanding participation in DEG of advanced content delivery and direct-to-consumer companies,” said Amy Jo Smith, DEG president and CEO. “I’m grateful that they see the value of membership in DEG, which has been working harder and smarter than ever since last year to provide our members increased opportunities for business collaboration, education and networking.”
DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group Aug. 24 announced Poppy Crum, chief scientist at Dolby Laboratories, as the 2021 recipient of the Hedy Lamarr Award for Innovation in Entertainment Technology.
In its fifth year, the Hedy Lamarr Award recognizes female executives in the fields of entertainment and technology who have made a significant contribution to the industry.
At Dolby, Crum is responsible for integrating neuroscience and data science into algorithm design, technology development and technology strategy. She is also an adjunct professor at Stanford University, focusing on the impact of modern technologies and immersive environments such as augmented and virtual reality on neuroplasticity and learning.
The 2021 Hedy Lamarr Achievement Award for Emerging Leaders in Entertainment Technology, honoring a female college student whose studies in the fields of entertainment and technology have shown exceptional promise, will be presented to Shambhavi Mishra, an undergraduate student at Carnegie-Mellon University who is double majoring in humanities analytics and music composition. Brianna Seaburg, a communications major at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at the University of Southern California (USC), is runner up. Both will receive a financial award to continue their education.
The awards will be presented during an online event Dec. 6.
“It is an honor to recognize Poppy Crum, an outstanding female leader in neuroscience and technology, with this year’s Innovation Award. She is a true visionary working to better lives and society through the development of immersive technologies,” said Amy Jo Smith, DEG’s president and CEO. “It is also a great pleasure to present the Achievement Award to Shambhavi Mishra to support her work toward ensuring that all voices and perspectives across the industry are heard equally. The 2021 Hedy Award winners are remarkable women in their field who clearly share Hedy’s passion for innovation.”
Crum said, “This honor represents a dedication to excellence in the field of technology initiated by Hedy Lamarr that continues to be led by many outstanding women who are committed to driving advancements that enhance our world and the experiences we have in it. It is truly gratifying to be recognized among them.”
Austrian-American actress Lamarr was a Hollywood legend who is best known for her roles in film classics including Samson and Delilah, The Strange Woman and Tortilla Flat. She was also a lifelong inventor whose innovative work included pioneering “frequency hopping,” which became the foundation for spread spectrum technology. Conceived by Lamarr and composer George Antheil for radio guidance systems and patented in 1942, this highly secure technology resists interference and dropout, and is utilized today for a variety of cellular, Wi-Fi and bluetooth applications.
Past honorees include Geena Davis, founder and chair of the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media; Nonny de la Peña, CEO of Emblematic Group; Dean Willow Bay of the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism; and Sara DeWitt, VP of PBS KIDS Digital.
To determine the award winners, DEG enlists its Canon Club Advisory Board, which comprises a cross-section of leaders representing the entertainment, technology, IT and consumer electronics industries.
I have so many fond memories and proud moments. Among the proudest was the formation of DEG Japan, where senior Japanese executives met under the guise of the DEG brand for meaningful dialog and to see what worked in their market. They were so self-guided; it was really inspiring to see. And, more recently, the creation of the Hedy Lamarr Awards to honor women making strides in entertainment and technology, an initiative championed by Marc Finer, who has worked side by side with me at DEG since day one. 
DEG helped launch DVD-Audio at the music industry trade show NARM in San Antonio in 2000. It was amazing to see the jaws of both music enthusiasts and experts drop when they heard classics like Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors or Joni Mitchell’s Both Sides Now. It was music they had heard countless times, but now they were hearing it differently. It came alive. DVD-Audio’s quality notwithstanding, digital won the race in the music business and DVD-Audio was a casualty as a mainstream format. 
Over the years, DEG helped promote many popular titles when they came out on DVD and Blu-ray Disc. One of my favorites was a promotion we did for Warner Home Video’s launch of You’ve Got Mail in New York City, where we passed out daisies in Central Park. My now-husband Jeff walked by and got some flowers. When we actually met two years later, we realized that our first encounter was me giving him daisies in the park!
DEG quickly became known for its coveted bags we’d give away at events, particularly the DEG Annual Reception at CES. The bags were stuffed with dozens of DVDs, then Blu-rays, plus lots of other fun branded items. I have many memories of the bags, but my favorites are receiving counterfeit bag tickets from attendees trying to score extra bags; walking through Heathrow Airport and seeing an executive from Paramount using the bag (pictured); and visiting the old city in Jerusalem and spying an executive’s teenage son using the DEG backpack!
DEG established DEG Japan as a means of flowing more information of emerging technologies to the membership. Attending DEG Japan’s annual meeting and Blu-ray Prize celebration was always a highlight. It’s been a pleasure to know and work with Tsukagoshi-san, formerly of Disney, and many others. Each trip was punctuated with a visit to Sony worldwide headquarters to visit their lab. I’ll never forget the moment they showed me 4K in their state-of-the-art theater. Colors and images came alive in a way I’d never imagined.
Over these 25 years, one thing that always strikes me is how the Board leaders, all executives with demanding day jobs, took the time to guide the organization, knowing that doing so would help grow the industry and, in turn, grow their businesses. I’m blessed that they all took the time to mentor and lead me, and that I may call each a friend, not just a colleague. DEG would not be marking 25 years in 2022 if it hadn’t been for their vision and leadership.
