Since 1991, Gerry Kaufhold has been with In-Stat, creating business models that are capable of predicting the dynamics of products for emerging, high technology marketplaces. He brings a unique and powerful insight to his analysis.

Gerry analyzes technology and market trends in the Digital Video industry, and forecasts the growth of emerging Digital Video applications that are delivered over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. These networks are becoming ubiquitous. The infrastructures that feed digital video to the “final mile” networks are undergoing rapid and massive changes.
Three items are key for success in the digital video space. First, consumers need to be able find what they want. Second, content providers need to make money. Third, the costs for storing, managing and delivering all this digital video needs to come way down. Sounds easy. It’s NOT.

When consumers begin to search for content, they will want to be able to scan all available options. This means traditional scheduled TV programming will need to be searchable, along with Video-on-Demand (VOD) options, Personal Video Recorder (PVR) content, video from the Internet, and related personal content that resides on in-home storage devices. Once a piece of content is “discovered” there will be up-sell opportunities to attach services or advertising that enhance the viewing experience. Content and Service Discovery Guides (CSDGs) will provide key revenue opportunities for all elements of the Digital Video ecosystem.

Pay-TV networks need to protect their traditional subscription revenues, and find ways to charge fees for online versions of their programs. Consumers want to keep their personal information private, but a lot of high-value TV content will demand authentication before it can be viewed. Advanced Advertising solutions require the ability to match “adverts” to end-users, so some amount of behavioral data will need to be used, but behind a secure firewall that protects individuals. And it all has to be able to work in a mobile environment, as well.

Events taking place in the commercial Information Technology (IT) industry will have a huge impact on tomorrow’s Content Delivery Systems. Modularized Data Centers that use virtualization and de-duplication will dramatically lower the cost of storage. New architectures that are based on Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS) hardware are already plunging prices for IT infrastructure.

Kaufhold coined the term "freckle effect" to describe the neighborhood-by-neighborhood rollouts of broadband networks. If you place a colored pin in a map to indicate the kind of broadband service available by neighborhood, you wind up with a pattern of colored dots, or "freckles" with white space in between. As we enter the world where Content merges with up-sell Services, each content provider and each service provider will need to be able to rapidly create and implement their own new money-making ideas. Different content suppliers will have their own approach to maximizing revenues. Once again, consumers will be faced with a “freckle effect” where content from one provider will come in with different features and options than content from another provider. It’s going to be a bumpy ride.

Prior to joining In-Stat, Gerry was new Business Development Manager for ST Microelectronics (formerly SGS-Thomson) and Linear Corporation. He was also Chief Engineer for commercial broadcast stations, and a contributing editor to Broadcast Engineering Magazine. He is a frequent contributor to Multichannel News and other industry journals. Mr. Kaufhold is frequently quoted in industry publications and other broadcast media, and he is a popular speaker at industry conferences with his wry style. His education is in physics and computer engineering.

Beyond contributing to In-Stat's syndicated research products, our analysts are available for custom consulting projects and can provide advisory services.