Innovid, a Sequoia-backed video ad company, announced that it is working with Cisco to bring advertisements to smartphones and tablets based on TV shows that viewers are watching during a specific moment. Cisco is able to do this by working with cable companies to analyze a TV show’s content, and pull keywords from that content, and show ads in the providers’ apps that are relevant to those keywords. While no cable partnerships have been announced, the companies are showing the tech at CES. Continue reading Innovid and Cisco Team Up to Deliver Ads to Second Screens

Embedded sensor technology has proven to be useful in a number of markets, but some are saying it can revolutionize the retail experience for both companies and consumers if used to its full potential. Though online retail is booming in popularity, many transactions still take place inside physical stores, often with the aid of a mobile device. By linking up those factors, shoppers’ experiences will be more productive, and companies will benefit with greater profits. Continue reading New Sensor Technologies Have Untapped Potential in Retail

Organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays may soon replace LCD displays if the manufacturing kinks can be worked out. These energy-efficient, flexible, vibrant displays can now be produced more easily and economically on giant ink-jet printers. Though mass production still faces challenges, equipment maker Kateeva says it has a solution that curbs the amount of wasted material and unwanted defect-causing particles that are common to the traditional vacuum chamber approach. Continue reading Is Ink-Jet Printing the Solution for Next-Gen OLED Displays?

Google is beta-testing a program that tracks consumers wherever they go using location data on their smartphones. It is the company’s answer to advertisers’ question: “How do we reach consumers who are on-the-go?” The program uses Android and iOS technology to track consumers’ locations and looks at their recent Google searches. Participating advertisers whose brick-and-mortar stores are nearby can pay to appear first in those listings. Continue reading Google Uses Location Tracking to Target Customers On-the-Go

Microsoft is expanding its TV programming in order to market the Xbox One as a portal for games, music and video content. Microsoft hopes its new console will merge television viewing and video game playing. Additionally, the company is producing a live action “Halo” show that will involve director Steven Spielberg and a concept development team in the Los Angeles area. This show is just one of many ideas currently being developed by Microsoft. Continue reading Microsoft Expands TV Efforts, Sees Xbox One as Media Portal

Mobile carrier Telefónica is testing technology from Expect Labs that listens in on phone calls. The new type of artificial intelligence provides suggestions based on key terms in a phone conversation, by converting the conversation to text and offering instant relevant information. New investments in the San Francisco startup have been made by Telefónica, Samsung and Intel. Google Ventures invested in Expect Labs back in October. Continue reading Expect Labs Software Understands Phone Conversations

Microsoft announced this week that it has scheduled a special Xbox event to be held May 21 at the company’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington. The company is expected to unveil its next-generation Xbox videogame console during the event, and is believed to be prepping the new console for a holiday release to compete with Sony’s anticipated PlayStation 4. Continue reading Microsoft Plans Event to Unveil Next-Gen Xbox Console

Though it won’t be widely available at first, a new, faster version of Wi-Fi is set to hit the market this year. It will give users the speed to download an entire television series in less than one minute. Called 802.11ac, it can triple the current norm’s typical speed, according to wireless experts, meaning it can handle more than a billion bits of data per second in ideal settings. Continue reading Wireless Development: High-Speed Wi-Fi Set to Launch

Twitter launched a standalone music app this weekend for a handful of “influencers.” The app, expected to be publicly available in a week, uses technology from music discovery site “We Are Hunted.” The Australian startup has been working with the social media giant to create an app called “Twitter Music,” which suggests music based on which accounts a user follows, and offers new tracks from favorite artists and up-and-coming musicians. Continue reading Twitter Music: New App Powered by We Are Hunted Site

When the fourth season of NBC’s “Community” aired in February, it pulled in 4 million viewers, which is roughly a quarter of the audience that tunes in to top hit sitcoms. Until recently, Nielsen numbers in that range might be the end of a series (think “Firefly,” “Jericho,” “Freaks and Geeks”). But on the night of the “Community” premiere, the show spawned two worldwide trending topics via Twitter — perhaps a more important metric today. Continue reading Should Nielsen Change How it Measures TV Audiences?

YouTube announced on Wednesday that it has reached the milestone of 1 billion monthly viewers. Google’s popular video-sharing subsidiary shared the news with advertisers at an extravagant upfronts presentation event at the YouTube Space production studio in Los Angeles, where Robert Kyncl explained that the amount of video the site streams on a monthly basis has grown 50 percent in the last year. Continue reading YouTube Tells Advertisers Site Has 1 Billion Monthly Viewers

While Google is best known for its powerful Web search engine, Android mobile operating system and acquisition of YouTube in 2006, it also offers lesser-known, but impressive services. From exploration to academia to art and much more, Google’s online products and services aim to inform users, improve lives and make them more secure. Business Insider lists 11 Google initiatives you may never knew existed. Continue reading Google is About More Than Just Search and Smartphones

According to Wired, a new chip war is on the way. For years, most of the massive data centers that power the Internet have been driven by Intel microprocessors. But in the coming months, a group of chip makers hopes to challenge the company with a new breed of processors based on ARM architecture, which is the same basic chip design found in most of the world’s smartphones. Continue reading New Chip War is Looming: Intel Versus ARM Architecture

Google announced that Andy Rubin, who has overseen the Android mobile operating system since 2004, will step down from his position. The announcement is the latest development in Google’s broad master plan for mobile. In Rubin’s place will be Sundar Pichai, the current head of Google’s Chrome Web browser and Chrome OS project, suggesting a future union between Android and Chrome. Continue reading Google Reveals Mobile Strategy with Android Restructuring

Based on numbers from mobile ad network Jumptap, which covers 134 million mobile users in the U.S. and 206 million mobile users worldwide, tablets accounted for 18 percent of all traffic on its network — compared to 78 percent for smartphones and 4 percent for feature phones. With the data from Jumptap’s most recent monthly report and its latest projections, tablets are set to continue this upward trend at a rapid pace. Continue reading Consumers Increasingly Turn to Tablets for Mobile Content