The Aussies banded together at CES this year, and did a nice job in with eight companies in one booth at the Hilton — which was called (of course) the Australia Pavilion. The whole effort was sponsored by the Australian Trade Commission and AEEMA, a computer industry association Down Under. I attended their press event at 11:00 this morning and met a number of the people involved, and later had time to catch at least one demo from the eight startups represented before I had to head off to the Yahoo press luncheon. 
I met Angus Robinson, the CEO of AEEMA, based in Sydney…Barbara Adams, a U.S. representative of the Australian Trade Commission (based in Orange County, of all places!)…Annette Ahern, an Aussie based in Melbourne working for the U.S. Consulate there, and Aussie Susan Fitzpatrick, CEO of PR firm Dateline Media (Palo Alto, Sydney, and New York). They did a great job putting together this first-time organized presence for Australia at CES. (In addition to the eight companies in their booth, Robinson said there are an equal amount of other Aussie companies with their own individual booths in the show.)
AEEMA’s Robinson said his organization decided last year, after he had scoped out CES for the past three years, that this was the year to “show the world what Australia can do.” He said many technologies had their beginnings in Australia, including “the 802.11 wireless standard, the technology behind the Dolby headphone, the IMAX rolling loop, the electric drill, the inflight black box, the refrigerator, and more.”
Later, the one firm I got a chance to spend my limited time with I was really impressed with: Bluebox Devices, based in Melbourne. It has nothing less than a new “from the ground up digital media platform for the home.” I saw the concept demoed, and it was very cool. “It’s a complete on-demand digital content purchasing and management system for the mass market – TV, movies music, and other media types,” said Robert Yearsley, CEO. 
Interestingly, I also met an investor and board member of the company, an Australian named Ron Nissen, who’s now based in Milwaukee! He told that Bluebox lets people watch the content they want for free. “Basically, the pay TV model isn’t working, and free-to-air TV isn’t either.” I’m betting they can get the attention of the content and advertising industry in the U.S. A main objective of the firm is obviously to meet partners at CES, the CEO told me. One good one sauntered up while I was there, and quickly got his attention: Warner Brothers! I’m pulling for these guys, and have already suggested a potential funding partner that I know would like to hear about their technology.
Tags: BlogHaus, PodTech, CES, Australia, Oz, Down Under, Bluebox Devices
Seems the reaction to the Gates keynote yesterday wasn’t all that great — a lot of the same themes as last year. (But as Robert Scoble said to me later, at least everything worked this time…..ha!) More of the buzz online this morning seemed to be focused on how Macworld is already starting to suck away the oxygen from CES — an event that will draw only about one-fifth as many people. 
A presentation this morning by Steve DiFranco, VP of sales and marketing for AMD, was interesting. He said that in the next three years, more glass will be sold than in the last 30! And a lot of that glass it for things we look at (not through, like windows), meaning all the many displays we have in our homes and offices on computers, TVs, phones and what have you. “This phenomenon has gone almost unnoticed,” he said. But, as you increase the amount of glass, he said, “you have to increase the amount of content you put on it” — which is certainly a focus of both this event and CES. “There are now multiple places to view content in our homes,” DiFranco said, and really everywhere we go. “And our houses must become more aware of content,” he said, referring to the huge opportunity in home networking devices (and his firm undoubtedly has some things up its sleeve in this regard). 
At last count, some 150 of us bloggers will be converging there to hang out in an upper-floor suite at the Bellagio, on Seagate’s dime. It’s a 24 x7 press room-slash-hangout-slash-party for bloggers of every stripe! Hey, who needs the show floor and all the sore feet that go along with it! Someone recently called this event “probably the best, and longest, blogger meetup ever”! I’m really looking forward to it, to seeing old friends and meeting new ones, and will certainly do some live blogging from there.
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