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Topic: Dolby's new sound system
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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002
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posted 03-08-2014 05:49 AM
quote: Sam D. Chavez
In my ideal business world the company is formed to make excellent products. You do this by hiring the best people empowering them and taking care of them in order to have a motivated work force. This is the real value of the company, products and people and loyal, happy customers.
Instead we have MBA's playing games to increase short term value for the shareholders, selling off the cores of companies, outsourcing manufacturing, treating customer service people like the enemy, etc.
MBA's are taught to do just this at every business school and these are supposed to be the smartest among us.
There are exceptions of course, Costco does a good job and Wallmart is atrocious, but that's just me talking.
Sam,
I agree with most of what you state here. Back "in the day" companies were formed and run by visionaries. Many of these people didn't graduate college (and didn't even go in some cases). They formed an ran a business based on your model of success. Prior to the early 1900s I guess the motivating of the workforce part was done in a different way by people like Andrew Carnegie (who, I don't even think attended high school or even middle school).
The only thing I disagree with is the Costco/Walmart comparison. The only real difference between the way the companies are run is the wages and benefits to employees are much better at Costco. However, the Costco model of compensation wouldn't work at walmart due to sheer size. Walmart has 9 times as many US locations and they are much bigger in square footage (requiring more employees per location).
The Costco model is to sell a higher dollar amount per square foot and per employee. That isn't to say that I don't think walmart could (and should) pay more than they do but they can't possibly get the productivity per employee to support the Costco model due to the sheer number of locations and average size of the locations.
In that comparison, it has nothing to do with MBAs.
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Terry Lynn-Stevens
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1081
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Dec 2012
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posted 03-15-2014 03:53 PM
Is this really what Dolby is focusing on?
Dolby Targets the Conference Call
Company to Add Speakerphone to Its Effort
Dolby built a brand by enhancing sound in recorded music, movies and television shows. Now it's targeting a fixture of the business world—the conference call.
The San Francisco-based company, facing pressures to diversify, has been working to improve sound fidelity and isolate individual speakers' voices during meetings conducted over the phone. Dolby last fall disclosed its technology, along with a conferencing service offered through BT Group BT.A.LN -2.24% PLC, and on Friday is unveiling updates that include a speakerphone that Dolby hopes to deliver later this year.
Dolby has joined a crowd of companies that are trying to profit from the continued growth of conference calls despite the rise of video-based alternatives. Some also are exploiting Web-based technologies and the related shift of callers to personal computers and smartphones.
Mike Hollier, an auditory science expert who joined Dolby as chief technology officer of its new communications division, said face-to-face meetings are more intelligible because of visual cues and people's two ears, which help distinguish where sounds are coming from. He said most traditional conferencing offerings compress the sound of voices in ways that strip out useful clues such as who is talking.
Dolby developed new conferencing software, some of which runs on BT's servers; accompanying software is installed on PCs or other devices equipped for audio calls. Dolby and BT on Friday also plan to unveil smartphone apps to work with the new service.
In a demonstration at Dolby's offices, the company showed off a prototype of its speakerphone, a circular device with a touch screen and microphones that help distinguish the direction of people talking. A person calling in on a smartphone can also notice the sense of movement as a speaker stood up and walked across the room.
In user tests, the company asked people to perform sets of tasks that were easy in face-to-face meetings, but declined to about 30% efficiency in a conventional conference call, Mr. Hollier said. Their efficiency rose to the "high 60s" after using Dolby Voice, he said.
"It is so clear. It picks up everything," said Rich Lappenbusch, president of StratusCore, a Seattle-based digital-media services company that tested the Dolby-based BT MeetMe service and is now a Dolby Voice customer. "It reminds me of the first time I saw HDTV."
The conferencing-technology business has many players, including Cisco Systems Inc. CSCO -0.79% and Polycom Inc., PLCM -1.59% and competition among free and paid service providers keep pushing per-minute charges down.
Analysts at Wainhouse Research estimate the number of conference-call minutes offered by service providers will reach 114 billion this year, up more than 50% since 2010. But world-wide revenue has been close to flat since 2010 at about $4.1 billion, the firm said.
Some rivals have also been pushing their own improvements in sound quality, questioning whether customers that test the alternatives will prefer the new Dolby Voice offering.
"Time will tell, but I think they face a pretty strong headwind," said Jeff Rodman, a Polycom co-founder who holds the title of fellow and chief technology evangelist.
Dolby, whose founder Ray Dolby died last year, has faced pressures to move into new markets as licensing revenue has slowed from products such as DVDs and PC software. The company, founded in 1965, has sold hardware to studio professionals but more often licenses technology to others.
In the case of its new conference phone, expected to be priced at around $1,600, Dolby executives said they wanted at least initially to control all of the audio experience.
"We think we're bringing tremendous differentiation to an industry that has heard about nothing but price per minute," said Kevin Yeaman, Dolby's president and CEO. "This business could be as big as any of our existing businesses."
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303546 204579437461592206926?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303546204579437461592206926.html
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