Uniquely among conferences, TVOT features an agenda that is developed through ongoing dialog with the industry.
Please contact Tracy Swedlow, at tracyswedlow@gmail.com or 415-608-4766, to discuss your proposal or click on the button “Submit a Speaker.” Also, please note that ITVT is not a pay-for-play organization and that speakers do not have to pay any fee to participate in our TVOT events.
Our next event will be announced fairly soon.
While carrying the “ethos” of a Marketing Technologist, Albert has always possessed a firm understanding of how technology has continued to transform the discipline of Marketing while disrupting today’s conventional consumer engagement models. Over that past 20+ years his communications experience ranges from African American, Hispanic, LGBT, Asian American, Arab American, Indian, Boomers, Millennials, Urban, GM to International.
His work involves Digital Marketing for Lexus, AMAZON, NYPD, Medline, State Fair, Spalding, HBO, MCD, LA Sparks, Game Show Network, Verizon Wireless, Unilever, Ford Division, Lincoln Mercury, Burger King, Colgate, HSBC, Time Warner Cable, Home Depot, AstraZeneca, US Marines, Pfizer, Novartis, Merck, and Hyatt Resorts.
He is currently the Managing Director, Digital Innovation at Walton Isaacson. Previously he served as the Director, Interactive Services for UniWorld Group and Director of New Media and Technology at Prime Access where he introduced the Digital capabilities for both multicultural agencies.
Albert has participated in numerous speaking engagements for Meltwater Social, MediaPost, Digiday, ThinkLA, AdAge, PUBMATIC, CYNOPSIS, Adweek, VAB and the ANA. This type of industry prowess resulted in him being named one of ADWEEK’s 2022 Media Allstars. Albert is also the host of The Transient Identiti podcast which chronicles the Voice of the Consumer.
For over 35 years Bill Harvey has been leading the way in media research with special emphasis on the New Media. He is often asked to provide his vision of the future of some specific part of the media world and has consulted for over a hundred Fortune 500 companies. Bill is known to many as a media futurist.
Bill Harvey after a history of innovation co-founded TRA, the first company to show that naturally occurring purchase and media data can be used to create the first actionable process for true ROI measurement and optimization. In 2012 TiVo acquired TRA, now called TiVo Research.
Today, beyond consulting for many companies, Bill has co-founded Research Measurement Technologies (RMT), which is developing a programmatic ROI optimizer that will benefit advertisers and content creators. RMT has breakthrough IP in two areas:
Bill has spent over 35 years leading the way in media research with special emphasis on the New Media. As the 24-year-old strategy head of the American Research Bureau (now Arbitron), he invented the Area of Dominant Influence or ADI, an audience-based definition of television markets that Nielsen emulated as the DMA, and which was called by Sales & Marketing Magazine “the most widely used marketing tool in the world today”. The ADI has profoundly influenced the advertising and television industries.
Harvey benefited from entering the advertising business exactly as the first mainframe computers were being turned to the task of media optimization. This led him to become one of the early pioneers of optimizers — and a media researcher who had to also learn about media effectiveness in order to program the optimizers. Media effectiveness as a subject falls between media research and advertising research and so Harvey was one of the few media researchers who crossed the line to combine both disciplines. He was most fortunate to have been tutored and mentored by some of the giants in the advertising and research industries including Mike Drexler, Erwin Ephron, Helen Johnston, Timothy Joyce, Burt Manning, Len Matthews, Hal Miller, Ed Papazian, Sandy Reisenbach, Jim Rosenfield, Arnie Semsky, Lester Wunderman, and too many others to mention here.
Before joining Arbitron, Harvey was a media research executive at Grey Advertising, Kenyon & Eckhardt, and Interpublic, specializing in the development of media optimizers.
Bill authored Mind Magic, a book on self-transformation, which has been used as a course text at thirty-four universities including NYU and UCLA. A popular speaker at media and futurist conferences around the world, he has written and been the subject of numerous articles in a wide range of consumer and media trade publications. From 1979 to 1999 his monthly newsletter, The Marketing Pulse, helped decision-makers at leading advertisers, agencies, and media companies understand important trends in media technology. That newsletter in 1979 accurately predicted the 3-network share of audience as it would be in 1990, and made many other projections that turned out to be prophetic, including predicting permission marketing, and coining terms that became generic such as clickstream and clickthroughs. In January 1999 that newsletter merged into The Myers Report.
In 1972, Harvey founded New Electronic Media Science (NEMS), a marketing media research consultancy that has served nearly 70 top advertisers and agencies, all major MSOs, virtually all major networks and all major Hollywood studios in the area of New Media. NEMS consulted for QUBE and numerous other early trials, for AT&T in the development of the 900 Number, had its first online service in 1972 and put the first online questionnaire on CompuServe for World Book in 1982. NEMS created International Research Services (IRS), which worked with research companies in 34 countries and compiled and harmonized ratings data from these countries into comprehensive reports for a number of Hollywood studios and networks. NEMS had clients in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Spain, The Netherlands, Japan, Australia, and a number of other countries.
In conjunction with IBM and Leonard Matthews, former CEO of Y&R and of Leo Burnett, Harvey founded Next Century Media (NCM). Next Century Media began as the leading interactive media advisor to advertisers, advertising agencies, entertainment, and media companies worldwide, and evolved into an enabler and service provider for addressable TV commercials and TV clickstream measurement. NCM led the development of addressable television advertising and interactive media measurement Standards, working with the ANA, 4A’s, ARF, IAB, FAST, Audit Bureau, NACHO, CableLabs, and CASIE. Harvey was the originator and drafter of the CASIE Principles which set the privacy standards for the industry. In 1995, in cooperation with Arbitron, NCM published The CyberMeasurement Index, the first compilation of Internet clickstreams to a common Standard, in which AOL was a leading participant; 34 agencies subscribed to the report. This was the first experiment in the amalgamation of clickstream data from multiple sources.
NEMS and NCM were leaders in the field of Media Effectiveness Measurement, the quantification of the higher order business effects of one medium versus another. Harvey believes that this is the Holy Grail within the marketing business: the ability to place an ROI value and not just an eyeballs value on a specific advertising investment. In the 70s, NEMS was highly active in this field, and among the notable studies conducted in that era was the measurement of a CBS Special sponsored by Ralston Purina, whose attitude shift and commercial recall scores tripled their scatter-plan norms, and the measurement of the same ads in Black Enterprise Magazine versus Newsweek, showing again three times the effectiveness for an average ad among upscale Blacks if the ad were seen in the context of their own specialized magazine.
Bill worked with Dr. Daniel Goleman (Emotional Intelligence) and Dr. Richard Davidson, today one of the top neuroscientists in the world, on the application of brainwave measurements to determining the effectiveness of advertising and media. NCM provided a number of clients with media effectiveness research studies, the best known of which are the Sponsorship Effectiveness Index (SEI), and the Commercial Retention studies conducted with cable operators. SEI established the power of native content earlier than any other research system. Harvey was founder and chairman of the New Media Model Committee of the Media Accountability Council for the Advertising Research Foundation, whose work achieved industry and ARF approval as the new ARF Media Model published in 2003, with tremendous leadership from Erwin Ephron, whom Bill invited to join as co-chair early on.
NEMS and Harvey were active in the development of digital out-of-home. In the late 80s, NEMS was the quarterback of a multi-studio study of the feasibility of deploying giant TV or computer screens in malls and other public places primarily supported by the motion picture industry marketing budgets. NEMS was also involved in numerous other research studies involving digital out-of-home in the U.S. and Europe. Next Century Media conducted studies of several important digital out-of-home media including mall video advertising for AdSpace, digital taxitop advertising for AdaptMedia, and others.
NCM consulted for such industry leaders as Microsoft and Amazon, and consulted on the development of websites for such companies as GM, Visa, Pepsi, Nissan, and many others, and for the clients of agencies such as BBDO, TBWA Chiat/Day, and Messner. Harvey was the Keynote Speaker at the first meeting of the Internet Advertising Bureau, and the speaker representing the advertising industry at the first WorldWideWeb Consortium Measurement Conference. At that conference, Harvey proposed the universal ID that Facebook and others are now achieving.
NCM invented and patented a system for making TV commercials targetable down to the individual home and person, which spawned an entire field with multiple companies competing to supply these important new advertising units. NCM produced reports from the Interactive Index, a service for certifying and compiling the immense “clickstream” (potentially every button push on remote control channel changers and PC keyboards) databases of interactive media worldwide, in cooperation with top research companies such as Nielsen and Arbitron. General Motors was the first subscriber to the Interactive Index, which received letters of support from most of the top 20 agencies.
Through those two companies, Harvey has been involved in every major New Electronic Media trial in the United States since 1975 and many other trials around the world. He brought more advertisers and agencies into more Interactive TV trials than everyone else in the world combined.
During 2003-2004 Harvey took a sabbatical from Next Century Media and Bill Harvey Consulting to accept the role of Senior Vice President and General Manager of OpenTV Research, a new unit he conceived for OpenTV — at that time a Liberty Media Company with a national deployment of 7 million US homes with interactive TV advertising and set-top box data (DirecTV + Charter). As GM he generated the reports of the landmark Aurora trial of SpotOn addressable commercials for Comcast, Coca-Cola, General Motors, Home Depot, Johnson & Johnson, and the U.S. Army, and began to develop the idea for TRA.
TRA was created to fill the need for a way to make single-source research economically scalable and sustainable. Singlesource — the tracking of both media and ad exposures plus purchases in the same sample over time — had been created but kept going out of business (Milwaukee Ad Lab, Adtel, ERIM, ScanAmerica, Apollo). TRA was the way to do it, using naturally occurring data at scale by connecting set-top box data and digital clickstream data to purchase data at the same-household level. This breakthrough quickly became widely copied and is today the major paradigm for the top digital companies. TiVo acquired TRA in 2012 and it is today called TiVo Research. Bill is its Strategic Advisor.
Research Measurement Technologies (RMT) is Bill’s current company. Co-founded with Bill McKenna and Lucas Tanner, RMT is a technology company like NCM. Where NCM was concerned with solving the problem of addressable commercials, RMT is focused on two inter-related problems:
RMT has exclusively licensed IP from NCM and also from Bill Harvey Consulting and is now serving major customers in both ROI and content, achieving positive cash flow in its first year.
So far the greatest excitement created by RMT is around DriverTags, the 265 metatags discovered by NCM and now exclusively licensed to RMT, which are the subconscious driving forces behind why a viewer selects this program rather than that one. Validated by set-top box data, Nielsen data, renewal vs. cancellation of series, and Hollywood creatives, DTags™ predict 76% of the variance in Nielsen ratings.
Bill’s vision is to use this technology to drive higher yield for content in a number of ways. And to provide a platform the industry can use to holistically maximize ROI on advertising in concert with all industry data and capabilities.
A digital expert and industry thought leader with almost 20 years of product and software development experience, Darren Sherriff serves as Senior Vice President of Advanced Ad Solutions within Fox Corporation’s Revenue Management & Strategy team, focusing on developing innovative solutions to precision-target audiences across FOX content, no matter how consumed. In addition to his concentration in advanced TV and addressable advertising, Sherriff oversees linear and digital programmatic advertising operations at FOX. Before joining the corporation as Vice President of Advertising Technology Solutions in 2016, he held tenure at NBCUniversal for more than a decade, in addition to serving in previous roles at WebMD and numerous marketing and consulting companies. He began his career as a software developer and project manager, where he honed his expertise in technology and helped launch countless enterprise-class web applications. Sherriff graduated from Champlain College with a degree in computer science.
Dave Morgan is the CEO and founder of Simulmedia, a New York-based company whose patented TV+® platform for cross-channel TV advertising guarantees marketers full audience reach, measurement and results across the dynamic linear and connected TV ecosystem in the U.S. The company also enables brands to connect with elusive younger audiences via PlayerWON™, the only in-game video advertising platform for free-to-play PC and console titles.
He previously founded and ran both TACODA, Inc., an online advertising company that pioneered behavioral online marketing and was acquired by AOL in 2007 for $275 million, and Real Media, Inc., one of the world’s first ad serving and online ad network companies and a predecessor to 24/7 Real Media (TFSM), which was later sold to WPP for $649 million. After the sale of TACODA, Dave served as Executive Vice President, Global Advertising Strategy, at AOL, a Time Warner Company (TWX).
A lawyer by training, Dave served as General Counsel and Director of New Media Ventures at the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association in the early 1990’s. Mr. Morgan is a Political Science graduate of The Pennsylvania State University and holds a J.D. from the Dickinson School of Law.
In his role as Chief Innovation Officer, Dr. Algranati leads an organization driven to helping clients meet their business goals by creating industry-leading media measurements solutions.
“Comscore has a unique ability to process and understand large amounts of data,” he says. “My team strives to use this wealth of information to design products and services that meet the needs of the industry.”
Before joining the Comscore team, he served as SVP, Television Product Innovation & Custom Research at Rentrak and held executive research positions at Experian Simmons including Director of Integrated Marketing Solutions. While at Simmons, he also led the statistics and research teams, overseeing all statistical responsibilities for the company including custom research projects.
Dr. Algranati holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from The George Washington University, a Master of Science in Statistics, a Master of Philosophy in Public Policy and a Ph.D. in Statistics and Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University.
When he is not working on the next generation of media measurement solutions, he is a devoted boxing fan, attending more than 2,000 boxing matches in the past 20 years.
David’s tenure at Viamedia is distinguished by substantial growth, strategic advancements, and a steadfast dedication to business development, finance, and fostering a positive corporate culture. He played a significant role in scaling the company from fewer than a dozen employees to over 400 today.
Prior to joining Viamedia, Solomon amassed a wealth of experience in advertising sales, spanning over twenty years. His career journey took him from Telecable in Lexington, Kentucky, to significant roles in sales management at TCI, AT&T cable advertising, and Comcast Spotlight advertising.
Solomon has been honored as a 2023 Cablefax 100. He is revered for his effective coaching and proven ability to build high-performing sales teams and foster a culture of growth and mentorship.
Recognized as a thought leader, Solomon contributes to key publications like MediaVillage, ACA Connects‘ Independent Communications News, and AiThority. He also regularly engages in prominent industry events, where he is featured on panels and as an expert at the forefront of innovative advertising strategies.
Solomon holds a Bachelor of Arts in Industrial and Organizational Psychology, from the University of Kentucky. Among numerous civic and charitable associations, Solomon is active in fundraising on behalf of Sunrise Children’s Services, which assists abused, abandoned or neglected children.
Erick Opeka is chief strategy officer and president of Cineverse, where he drives the distribution company’s corporate strategy and M&A efforts, and also oversees a portfolio of more than two dozen streaming SVOD, AVOD and FAST linear networks available online, on mobile devices, gaming consoles, and connected TVs. These networks include the company’s recently-launched flagship streaming service Cineverse, as well as Fandor (indie film), Screambox (horror), Docurama (documentaries), CONtv (fandom), Dove Channel (family), RetroCrush (anime), AsianCrush (pan-Asian) and others. Under Opeka’s leadership, the company has entered into several channel partnerships with significant partners, including for the company’s newest streaming channels The Elvis Presley Channel (in partnership with Elvis Presley Enterprises LLC and ABG Entertainment), pop culture-focused NacellePop (with The Nacelle Company) and, coming soon, The GoPro Channel (with Roundtable Entertainment and GoPro, Inc.). Opeka has nearly 20 years of experience as an executive at the intersection of entertainment and technology. Prior to Cineverse, Opeka co-founded and ran New Video Digital, growing it into the largest independent film and TV aggregator in the world. He began his career at Madstone Entertainment, a vertically-integrated exhibitor, distributor and digital cinema pioneer. In addition to his role at Cineverse, Opeka is on the Board of Directors and executive committee of OTT.X, the preeminent trade group representing the streaming industry, and serves as an advisor to numerous streaming and entertainment companies through his work with seed accelerator Techstars. He is also a member of the Producers Guild of America and the Television Academy of Arts & Sciences.
In her current role, Helen Katz leads the global research unit within Publicis Media’s data sciences practice. She is a trusted industry expert on research, with a particular focus on data quality and reliable measurement. Her interest in innovation inspired her to play an instrumental role in developing best practices in the measurement of addressable TV and advanced video campaigns in the U.S. A 19-year Publicis Groupe veteran, Katz has served in various strategic research capacities for Publicis Media, Starcom, Zenith and GM Planworks – the holding company’s former division devoted to the General Motors business. In 2009, she was integral to the Publicis Groupe team that launched The Pool – a unique research consortium that aimed to identify the next new ad formats across various channels such as online video, mobile/tablets and more. Prior to joining Publicis Groupe, she was Vice President, Media Research Manager at DDB Needham. She began her career as an advertising professor at Michigan State University, and is currently an adjunct professor at DePaul University. She has published numerous articles in industry and academic journals, as well as three textbooks on advertising and media, the most recent of which is The Media Handbook (7th edition, 2019). She is the ex-officio Chair of the Executive Committee of the Media Rating Council, and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Advertising Research Foundation. Katz is also the recipient of the Advertising Research Foundation’s “Great Minds” award for research innovation, Jay Chiat’s Strategic Excellence Silver Award for innovation, and Stars of Attribution leadership award. Katz has a master’s degree in advertising and a Ph.D. in communications from the University of Illinois, and was an undergraduate English major at the University of London.
Howard Shimmel is a television research and insights veteran with over 30 years of change-making thought leadership under his belt. As the President of Janus Strategy & Insights, he is transforming how companies around the world strategize and position their television marketing offerings, from linear methods to addressable and connected TV. Howard also serves as a Board Member and Head of Strategy for datafuelX, an advanced analytics firm focused on developing best in class decision science models to fuel the next generation of media capabilities, specifically focused on forecasting and optimization.
From attribution to advertising, data to ROI, Howard is carving the path to address the changing trends in the audience landscape, as well as shape emerging platforms and industry innovations. He leverages this knowledge to lead organizations through strategy, planning, buying, measurement, and stewardship.
Beyond his role at Janus, Howard is co-founder of datafuelX, an advanced analytics firm focused on developing best in class decision science models to fuel the next generation of media capabilities.
Howard also serves as an advisor and investor in many emerging new age research companies, including Hyphametrics, Adelaide, WeAre8, and Humantel.
Prior to starting this company, Howard was Chief Research Officer Turner, where he oversaw all multi-screen entertainment, news, kids and sports research, as well as corporate analysis and insight-led efforts.
Shimmel played a critical role in driving the company’s efforts around the consumer journey and insights to better capture measurement for both Turner and its partners. In 2016, in partnership with Turner Ad Sales’ Turner Ignite team, Shimmel oversaw the launch of Turner Ad Lab, an initiative whose goal was to make recommendations about linear and digital video ad experience in light of the changing TV landscape.
Prior to be promoted to his role in 2014, Shimmel was senior vice president of ad sales and sports research for Turner, where he oversaw television and digital research analysis and strategy support for the company’s news, entertainment, animation, young adults & kids and sports advertising sales units. He joined Turner from Nielsen Media & Advertising Analytics where he served as executive vice president responsible for building out an advanced analytic business focused on issues like cross-platform analytics, advanced media targeting, promotion effectiveness and ROI measurement, for media companies, agencies and advertisers. Shimmel’s industry-rich experience includes other leadership roles at The Nielsen Company, America Online, WBIS and MTV Networks. He also served as president of Symmetric Resources, Inc. Over the span of his career, Shimmel has developed research expertise related to technology adoption, methodology and advertising’s impact on sales.
Prior to starting MyBundle, the premier online platform connecting consumers, streaming services and broadband providers with tools to simplify streaming television, Jason was a Portfolio Manager at Buckingham Capital Management, where he researched and invested in the Media/Telecom Sector with a special focus on how streaming TV was disrupting the traditional ecosystem.
Jason believed consumers would benefit from the increasing choice afforded by streaming, however with all that choice came fragmentation and new challenges for the underlying business. Jason started MyBundle to be the aggregator the marketplace needed to help simplify streaming for consumers, streaming services and broadband providers alike.
Jason graduated with a Bachelor’s of Arts degree from the Macaulay Honors College at The City University of New York and lives in Fort Lauderdale, Florida with his wife and two children.
Julian Zilberbrand is the Executive Vice President of Advanced Media & Data Solutions for Paramount. Zilberbrand oversees key areas within the Paramount Technology and Sales divisions including all addressable business partnerships, technologies, and measurement as well as audience onboarding and segmentation, and identity management. Zilberbrand is also responsible for InView, Paramount’s holistic investment, reporting, and insights platform that provides instant access and a clear picture of clients’ investment portfolio in one environment.
Previously, Julian was Executive Vice President of Advanced Media for ViacomCBS Vantage, where he was responsible for growing agency and advertiser revenue through the enablement of Viacom’s data-driven advanced TV advertising solutions. Zilberbrand also served as Executive Vice President of Audience Science at ViacomCBS, overseeing audience digital media executions, audience onboarding and segmentation, and advanced analytics.
Prior to joining ViacomCBS, Zilberbrand was Executive Vice President of Activation Standards, Insights and Technology at ZenithOptimedia. In this role, he managed the activations standards, digital operations, analytics, technology and strategic partnerships groups. Before joining Zenith, he was Senior Vice President, global digital director, strategic partnerships and technology solutions at Starcom Mediavest Group. Prior to joining the agency world in 2004, Zilberbrand held product specialist and client service roles at Eyeblaster and developed the company’s Eyeblaster University training program. Earlier in his career, he worked at DoubleClick as a project manager and technical analyst.
In addition to his work responsibilities, he has held advisor roles for the IAB, 4A’s and the iMedia conferences. Zilberbrand is known as a vocal and respected leader in the industry covering a wide array of topics from advanced TV solutions to viewability with the 3MS Blue Ribbon committee and general media trends. From 2013-2014, Zilberbrand chaired the Digital Committee for the Media Ratings Council and was recognized by the organization for his leadership and service. He has received several industry recognitions over the years including the AdMonster Digital Media Leadership Award, the Data, Analytics and Operations Innovator of the year award at the Marketers Choice Awards as well as recognition in AdAge’s 40 under 40 list.
Julian is a frequent speaker at industry conferences including Beet.TV, Mediaweek, NYC TV Week, IAB events and more. When not driving the media landscape forward, Julian can be found routing for The Mets and NY Giants. He resides in New Jersey with his wife and son.
Matthew Durgin is Vice President of Content & Services for LG Electronics. Based in the LG’s North American headquarters in the New York City Metro Area, he oversees LG’s Smart TV Business team covering the North American market. Matt and his team’s primary responsibilities include partner negotiations, partner engagement, LG Channels, webOS licensing, and TV innovation partnerships. During the past 15 years at LG, he has led hundreds of new content partnerships including Netflix, Amazon, Max, Disney+, Hulu and ESPN. In that time, LG has distributed over 200 million LG TVs globally including webOS Smart TVs in the US and Canada markets. LG Channels, is a FAST service with more than 300 channels including the exclusive NCAA Championships channel. Matt also serves as Chairman of the Board of Alphonso Inc. operating LG Ad Solutions, as a Board Director of the Digital Entertainment Group (DEG) and chair of their Connected Devices Committee. Additionally, he is a board member of the Consumer Technology Association’s (CTA) Content and Entertainment Council.
Mike leads Strategic Partnerships across Technology, Platform, Data and Media for United MileagePlus. He is responsible for building partnerships to enable personalized and immersive experiences to surprise and delight United customers from the time they plan their journey to the next planning period, and all points in between. Mike is an AdTech veteran, building and leading organizations across Global Partnerships, Programmatic ad marketplace, Privacy and Data, and Content Syndication. He is an original member of Advertising.com, spending nearly 23 years with Advertising.com through its most recent brand, Yahoo before exiting to the startup world, and now United Airlines.
Pete Doe is Chief Research Officer at Nielsen. He has decades of experience in market research, audience measurement, big data and statistical modeling techniques. In his current role he leads Nielsen’s Data Science Organization, overseeing the development of audience measurement methodologies across video, digital and audio globally. This is his second stint at Nielsen: between 2004-2015 he was a primary architect of Nielsen’s data integration products and contributed to patented innovations in Set Top Box measurement, Digital and Outdoor Advertising Research. Between 2015-2022, Pete was Chief Research Officer at clypd, an advanced TV platform start-up acquired by Xandr in 2019, which in turn was acquired by Microsoft in 2022. Before moving to the United States, Pete was a board director at RSMB TV Research in the UK, where he worked primarily on the BARB TV audience measurement currency as well as data fusion projects. He started his career at NOP Market Research in London. Pete is a graduate of King’s College, London University.
Richard Glosser is a Managing Director at Oaklins DeSilva+Phillips, specializing in M&A advisory for Broadcasting, Streaming, and Sports Technologies. ODP is a 28-year-old middle-market investment bank based in New York City that is focused on Marketing, Media, and Technology. The firm is a part of Oaklins, the world’s largest and most successful M&A advisory organization in the mid-market, with over 850 investment banking professionals in 45 countries.
He has vast experience as a senior media and technology executive and operator. Most recently, he was Head of Business Development at Verance, where he played a pivotal role in bringing its watermark-based solution for ATSC 3.0/NextGen TV to the broadcast television and consumer electronics industries. Previous to Verance, Richard was Senior Vice President of Corporate Development and Digital at CSTV: College Sports Television (now CBS Sports Network) and as Founder and President of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s early digital efforts. He was also Executive Director of Emerging Media at Condé Nast Digital where he led their video and mobile initiatives. During his tenure at Hilltop Digital, Richard advised clients such as ABC News, Trendrr (now part of X), Alphonso.TV, ION Media (now part of Scripps), SpotX (now part of Magnite), and Corbis Entertainment.
He holds a BS from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from Columbia Business School.
Rick leads BIA/Kelsey’s strategy consulting practice and serves as an advisor to an affiliated investment banking group BIA Capital Strategies. Rick works with media, adtech and martech companies to see and evaluate opportunities and strategies in the market to achieve corporate goals. He helps client with strategic planning, developing partnership strategies, product planning, and achieving revenue growth and diversification. He helps marketers including brands and agencies with effective planning and use of digital media platforms. He also works on investment banking projects assisting buy-side and sell-side clients.
Rick Howe is a cable and television veteran, elected as a Cable Pioneer in 2011. He leads the ITVT/TVOT “Televisionation: Friday Fireside” video series as The iTV Doctor, and provides consulting services to distributors, content providers and app developers in the enhanced television space.
Rob leads USIM’s strategic insights, optimization, and reporting activities, helping agency and client teams achieve their brand goals. He has created a new architecture of strategic decision-making, underpinned by data, and using agency assets in programmatic and addressable advertising combined with third-party custom data and media analytics.
To enhance these insights, Rob has designed new AI-based optimization tools to lead location/trading zone investment strategies via traditional, programmatic, addressable, and automated buying channels. In addition, he has developed a customized but fully flexible client-reporting platform that enables immediate cross-channel analytics and optimization.
Rob joined USIM following his role as Global Lead, Branded Apps at Publicis Media, where he developed proprietary insights and optimization tools across multiple business units. An industry thought leader, he has presented at SXSW and ARF on topics related to consumer experience and owned/paid media.
Rob has more than 20 years of experience in marketing analytics, audience sciences, media strategy, media buying, and research. He has created unique, data-driven insights, tools, and strategies for clients such as Verizon, 20th Century FOX, FX Networks, Disney, Toyota (Scion), Nestle, JP Morgan Chase, Hewlett-Packard, FOX, General Mills, and Sonic Drive-In.
Sam Bloom is Head of Partnerships for PMG. Prior to this, Sam was the CEO of Dallas-based Camelot Strategic Marketing & Media. In Sam’s 20+ years at Camelot, he helped transition the agency from a traditional media shop into one of the leaders in integrated marketing and advanced analytics. His prior experience includes executive roles at Blockbuster Video as well as several start-ups, including Broadcast.com. Sam was also a goalie for the University of Virginia’s National Championship soccer team and keeps his passion for soccer burning with regular visits to the UK to attend English Premier League matches.
Tinashe Chaponda is a Zimbabwe-born entrepreneur and the founder of Sosani Studios, a creative agency specializing in influencer marketing.
Prior to founding Sosani Studios, Tinashe was a former comedy creator, giving him a unique understanding of the creator landscape and the power of authentic connections. He has leveraged this experience to lead Sosani to help over 200 brands, including household names like Lexus, Julie Care, Amazon, Warner Brothers, Cash App and Unilever, connect with Gen Z and Millennial audiences through strategic influencer campaigns. Talent included the likes of Dwayne The Rock Johnson, ESPN’s Monica McNutt, Lil Yachty, and Khaby Lame the biggest Tiktoker in the world.
Tinashe is a passionate advocate for the “Creator Anatomy” approach, which emphasizes understanding the core of the influencer and their audience to create impactful campaigns. He also shares his insights on the future of the creator economy through his podcast, Done Deal for Influencer Marketers.
Tracy Swedlow is the CEO, publisher, and editor-in-chief of InteractiveTV Today (ITVT), which she founded in 1998, and is also the executive producer and director of the TV of Tomorrow Show (TVOT) conferences.
Her writing has appeared in many leading newspapers and trade publications, including the New York Times, the San Francisco Examiner, PC World, Multimedia World and VR World. Topics she has covered in the past include virtual reality, email communities, privacy and technology, online gravesite memorials, and, of course, interactive television.
Prior to founding ITVT, she was chief evangelist at eGroups.com (now Yahoo! Groups); new media editor at PC World; a producer and director for Telemorphix, a pioneering interactive TV company, and a video producer at Steve Michelson Productions in San Francisco.
A regular presenter at ITV industry conferences and panels, and a frequent guest on television and radio shows, she actively communicates her understanding of the history of interactive TV; its current trends, technologies, content innovations and applications; the complexities of executive leadership and industrial dynamics; and where she thinks the medium and the ITV industry will and must go in the future to audiences around the world. She has served as the founding chairperson and judge of the “Television” and the “Broadband” categories respectively for The Webby Awards since its inception and regularly produce editorial events and awards programs benefiting the ITV industry (e.g. The annual TV of Tomorrow Show).
Other experiences include voiceovers on many feature films while at Sound One in New York City (e.g. “Hannah and Her Sisters” and “9 1/2 Weeks”); participation in the Director/Playwright Workshop at Playwright’s Horizons in New York City with founder, Bob Moss; participation on various experimental technology multimedia theater showcases directed by the visionary George Coates in San Francisco; conceiving, producing, directing the first 3 fashion shows (as interactive theater) on the Black Rock Desert in the early years of the Burning Man project, and directing an episode of the Twlight Zone called “The Obsolete Man” at the Dark Room in San Francisco. In August 2005, she created and directed a politically-charged multimedia “blogtheater” (my word) piece that focused on post-election America called “Fuck That!: The Political Science Show.” In her non-spare time, she produces and edits the occasional book such as “Desert to Dream” (a photography book) and “Train of Thought” (a children’s book), trains as a traditional boxer, and paints http://tracyswedlow.work. She also recently published her first collection of poems in “No Visiting ‘Till My Show Is Over” published on Amazon. She is also a mother to a wonderful little girl named Hannah and wife to Richard Washbourne, the co-owner and co-producer of ITVT/TVOT.
Her education includes a Ph.D fellowship in directing at the University of California, Berkeley; a Masters degree in Dramatic Criticism from Northwestern University; a certificate in French and French Literature from the Université de Cannes; a Bachelor of Arts degree in Theater History from Tulane University; studies in Drama at the Royal Holloway College at the University of London; as well as a high school degree from Culver Military Academy in Indiana.
Originally from Columbus, Ohio, she witnessed the birth of QUBE, the first commercially deployed interactive television platform, and CompuServe, the first commercial online service. She is also the proud creator of an artcar.
