A Look Back At The Audience Response Industry: 2005
I’ve seen more changes this year than perhaps in the previous five years combined. While the first half of the year was quiet, the second half was far from it.
It started with Infocomm. Fleetwood introduced Reply WW (Worldwide) a much smaller, lighter, more powerful and more cost competitive product. Turning Technologies ventured into the radio frequency market with ResponseCard RF which has been broadly accepted by higher education.
Soon thereafter, Ubiqus purchased Reactive Systems Inc (RSI) audience response business, the owners of Audience Response Rentals LLC purchased a majority stake in Communications Technology (ComTec) and National Auto Credit who already owns Audience Response Systems Inc (ARS) purchased Option Technologies Interactive LLC (OTI).
As the year winds down, we are hearing from more than one source that Fleetwood is gearing up for a major marketing push early in 2006 to deepen their hold on the US market and to expand significantly in Asia.
So where will this take us? My guess is that the interactive meeting market will continue to grow quickly, driven by easier to use products at lower prices. This year could prove to be the one that takes audience response voting to the mainstream where we might see as many as 1 in 8 meetings using the technology to one extent or another.
It started with Infocomm. Fleetwood introduced Reply WW (Worldwide) a much smaller, lighter, more powerful and more cost competitive product. Turning Technologies ventured into the radio frequency market with ResponseCard RF which has been broadly accepted by higher education.
Soon thereafter, Ubiqus purchased Reactive Systems Inc (RSI) audience response business, the owners of Audience Response Rentals LLC purchased a majority stake in Communications Technology (ComTec) and National Auto Credit who already owns Audience Response Systems Inc (ARS) purchased Option Technologies Interactive LLC (OTI).
As the year winds down, we are hearing from more than one source that Fleetwood is gearing up for a major marketing push early in 2006 to deepen their hold on the US market and to expand significantly in Asia.
So where will this take us? My guess is that the interactive meeting market will continue to grow quickly, driven by easier to use products at lower prices. This year could prove to be the one that takes audience response voting to the mainstream where we might see as many as 1 in 8 meetings using the technology to one extent or another.
