If you attended our CES 2025 webinar earlier this week, you probably gathered this year’s event was much more transformative than in recent years. The omnipresence of AI at exhibit after exhibit compelled attendees to have to work hard to conceptualize how various AI platforms and use cases might fit into their businesses – like broadcast radio, for example.
Just hours before the first tour began, Paul and I experienced that famous “CES serendipity.” It’s where you discover something unexpected, exciting, and even occasionally mind-blowing while on your way to experience something else. For us, the specific applications were similar – how AI will change the way marketers place and analyze their buys and how it will streamline the production of effective and professional commercials.
The two exhibiters were LG and SK (the third biggest company in South Korea). And the examples I mentioned were buried in corners of exhibits that were thousands of square feet in size and scope. Neither are simple concepts, but both could clearly be game-changers in the way marketers apply their goals and their dollars. Sure enough, both exhibits turned out to be ones many of our attendees pointed to as most relevant on the tour.
And at one point along the way, I got to thinking about how broadcast radio’s C-suite club has been tasked – among their many other duties – to evaluate new and emerging technologies that may – or may not – rock the radio business. And it occurred to me the job now requires a more-than-average understanding of technologies and their implications.
Over the last couple decades, innovation has been unleashed, now a torrent of new ideas and concepts that demand attention and thought, requiring leaders to know more than just the basics of how things work and their ability to impact our business, along with our constituents – audiences, advertisers, and their communities.
This goes beyond merely tracking digital vs. analog ad spend, the Cliff’s Notes chart that shows how the economics of the media business have been disrupted and forever altered. But it’s about the change that begins with consumers and how they entertain and inform themselves and how we can reach them.
When we consider how the devices, options, outlets, and platforms have changed in less than a quarter century, the tech revolution in which we’re all immersed is a firehose our industry’s leadership must somehow navigate, comprehend, and apply to their situations.
Looking back on past communications breakthroughs – the telegraph and later, the inventions of radio and television, this one’s different in its societal, cultural, and geopolitical implications. And it all starts with an understanding of technology’s changing impacts on everything we do.
That’s why I give so much credit to those who have attended our guided CES tours over these last many years. The hundreds of curious managers who have shared this journey with us are proof positive of the value of not just keeping up, but seeing around the corner.
Me, with Jerry Lee at Lucky’s at CES
As one of radio’s all-time greats, Jerry Lee, put it it to me years ago when explaining why he’s attended more than 50 CES conventions over the decades, “I don’t want to miss the future.”
Jerry’s prophetic line echoed in my head the other day when I happened upon a story in The Verge about the CEO of Sonos, Patrick Spence.
He’s held the top spot at Sonos, the leading multi-room wireless speaker system that lets the user program audio throughout a home, room by room. Over the last several years in our Techsurveys, we have included Sonos (as well as competitor Bose) type systems in our list of gadgets we inventory to determine who owns what.
While TS 2025 is still in the field a couple more weeks, last year’s study revealed more than one in four (26%) respondents now own one of these sound systems in their dwellings, the highest level ever.
Sonos has led the way in developing and improving these systems, the software and of course, the speakers themselves. Apps, of course, have been integral in this process as user control the flow and volume of their chose entertainment content with their smartphones.
And that’s where Spence’s story comes into focus. He was let go after nearly 13 years on the job, during which time he’s overseen the debut of many tech improvements and innovations.
But for the latest iteration of the Sonos app released last May, an update to the company’s S2 software, Spence announced its release this way:
“We felt now was the time to reimagine our app experience. After thorough development and testing, we are confident this redesigned app is easier, faster and better. It once again raises the bar for the home music listening experience, and sets up our ability to expand into new categories and experiences.”
He would live to eat those words. The Verge reports the new version of the Sonos app was rush-released in order to be matched up to a new headphone product, the Sonos Ace.
Reports from users indicate the app was missing key features and beset by bugs that outraged its millions of users, especially vocal in community forums and subreddits.
Unfortunately for Spence, Sonos didn’t meet the challenge head-on until October. By then, reviewer Chris Welch called the app debacle a “full-on PR disaster.”
It cost Spence his job. Less than two weeks ago, he was forced to turn in his resignation. Sonos is now in the hunt for a new leader. But suffice it to say, Welch notes these past eight months have bene “the most challenging time in Sonos’ history.”
We don’t know the internal issues that may have played a role in Spence’s demise at Sonos. But when it comes to products that real consumers use and spend time with – a gadget, an app, a morning show, an event – it is essential corporate leadership experiences them personally.
As we like to say around here, “Eat your own dog food.”
The jacapps team will tell you that yours truly is the harshest reviewer they have – not out of pleasure but out of necessity. I am skilled at recognizing bugs, inefficiencies, and illogical paths technology often takes.
In other words, I’ve eaten a lot of dog food over the decades, a task that is often unpleasant and even cringe-worthy, but necessary in companies both big and small.
Along the way, my CES experiences – which I refer to as my “continuing education” – has equipped me to assess new products more logically, ask better questions, and constructively challenge our teams.
Like any skill – whether its horseback riding, playing pickleball, or hosting a talk show – developing one’s Tech IQ is a process that takes time, practice, and repetition.
It became very apparent to me earlier this month while making the rounds at CES just how much more difficult mastering this discipline has become as technology has exponentially grown.
The AI Era – or “revolution,” as it may eventually be called – will very likely end up testing the Tech IQ of leaders throughout many different sectors. But this I know – media is one of them that will very much be affected by the continuing development and applications of AI.
Which corporate chieftains turn out to be most knowledgeable in this space may not be the key determinant of success moving forward. But it will be a factor in the growth, decline, and survival of most of them.
During a post-mortem call with the smart and savvy team at the Consumer Technology Association, their executive leader – who now understands the broadcast radio business quite well – asked this question:
“Instead of sponsoring two tours these past few years, why aren’t you guys taking a least twice as many radio leaders through CES each year?
Good question. And one I’ll leave you to comment on.
Meantime, if I’ve helped stimulate your appetite a bit, pull up a chair, grab a fork, and let me serve up a heaping helping of dog food.
It’ll taste better than it looks. I promise.
PS – On Wednesday we shared our observations and the entire CES experience on a webinar with hundreds of interested broadcasters. If you missed it, and want a taste of CES, you can watch it here: WATCH: CES 2025 Recap
Originally published by Jacobs Media
