Crowdfunding Expected to be a Hot Consumer Electronics Topic at CE Week in New York

By Robert Hoskins

CE Week announced plans to host an innovative new lineup of keynotes and Crowdfunding conference sessions from the most well known names in the technology industry. The 2013 CE Week Line Shows and Exhibits are scheduled for June 26-27 at the Metropolitan Pavilion and Altman Building in New York City. This event is the official show headquarters of a week-long series of CE technology events taking place in the city over the course of CE Week, June 24-28.

CE Week LIne Shows & Exhibits is the Official Headquarters of CE Week, featuring the show’s largest exhibit floor of new products and start-ups, the largest concentration of conferences and attendees.

To kick off CE Week, the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) is producing a Research Summit on Monday, June 24, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. This event at the High Line Hotel will provide timely intelligence on the unique and important market trends and transformations emerging in the consumer electronics industry.

Aereo Founder and CEO Chet Kanojia will join Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of CEA, for an in-depth conversation about how technology innovation drives Aereo’s business strategy, at 10:30 a.m., Wednesday, June 26.

Living in Digital Times will display the best and brightest in mobile app technology at the Mobile App Showdown. During this live event at 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday, June 26, ten finalists will put their apps to the test and the audience will cast the deciding vote on the best app.

Top company executives from Pioneer, Monster, Kenwood, Toshiba, IK Multimedia, Samsung and BlueBOLT will introduce new products and discuss what’s ahead for their companies during press conferences.

The CE Week SuperSessions will address popular topics including 3D printing, crowdfunding, and the next generation of gaming. Sessions include:

Polygon SuperSession: Video Gaming’s Other Next-Gen [June 26 at 1:35 p.m.] – With so much attention focused on new video game consoles from Microsoft and Sony, both of whom are poised to usher in another “next generation” of gaming later this year, it’s easy to miss that an entirely separate alternative generation of video game consoles is taking shape. Join us as we explore this nascent “other” generation, typified by a focus on mobile hardware, open operating systems, digital delivery and an indie-friendly publishing model.
Moderator: Christopher Grant, editor-in-chief, Polygon

CNET SuperSession: Bringing 3D Printing to Consumers [June 26 at 3:15 p.m.] – We hear about new 3D printing breakthroughs almost every week now, ranging from houses to prosthetic skull implants to 3D printing on Mars. For consumers, 3D printing is either science fiction, or it suffers from the perception that it’s an expensive, time-consuming hobby with little practical utility. How can consumer-facing 3D printing companies improve their image and attract more mainstream users? Should that even be the goal? This panel will explore the issues and solutions around taking 3D printing to the mass market.
Moderator: Rich Brown, senior editor, CNET

Mashable SuperSession: The Battle Over Smartphone Screen Size [June 27 at 10:15 a.m.] – Since 2010, the average size of cell phone screens has increased by almost a full inch. Plus-size phones like the Samsung Galaxy Note have expanded the displays of all models, to the point where it’s impossible to buy a top Android phone with a screen smaller than 4.7 inches. Does this trend have a ceiling, and what does it mean for people with normal-size hands?
Moderator: Lance Ulanoff, editor-in-chief, Mashable

PCWorld/TechHive SuperSession: Who’s Fastest? Wireless Speed Test Results [June 27 at 12:15 p.m.] – PCWorld/TechHive Editor Mark Sullivan and OpenSignal Co-Founder and CEO Brendan Gill present results from their annual study of 4G and 3G wireless speeds. This year, testers visited 20 cities and measured speeds at the street level to give wireless customers independent data on which carrier offers the best speeds and coverage in the U.S.

Engadget SuperSession: Crowdfunding the Hardware Revolution [June 27 at 1:45 p.m.] – Welcome to the dawn of the age of hardware startups. Sites like Indiegogo and Kickstarter have changed the way we think about starting a business, from funding to user feedback. We’ll talk to success stories about the new business paradigm and discuss some tips for getting started in the world of crowdfunding.
Moderator: Brian Heater, director of media, Engadget

The CE Week Line Shows Conference Program is part of the full CE Week conference program, including 50-plus sessions and featuring more than 150 speakers. Conference tracks include the CEA Research Summit, Crowdfunding, Women in CE Forum, Connected Car Conference, Digital Health Summit, 2^nd Screen Summit, Ultra HD Conference and Techlicious Summit.

To register for CE Week visit https://secure.events-registration.com/ceweek2013/ Join in on the CE Week conversation by tweeting using the hashtag #ceweek.

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Front Page PR Offers Free Crowdfunding Conference Template for National Trade Show and Exhibit Companies

How to Plan a National, Regional or Local Crowdfunding Trade Show

By Robert Hoskins, Front Page PR

Crowdfunding is a growing industry and more and more people are discovering the benefits of using the power of the crowd to finance their new business. While Equity Crowdfunding is not legal yet, rewards and perk based Crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo, iCrowd and others are growing at double digit rates on a monthly basis.

Many people are just now discovering the Crowdfunding industry for the first time and are actively searching for trade shows, conferences, seminars and workshops to learn about the Crowdfunding process.

Like any new industry, the Crowdfunding industry is replete with supposed Crowdfunding experts that want to charge hundreds to thousands of dollars to share their infinite Crowdfunding knowledge with newcomers seeking to learn all there is to know about Crowdfunding.  If any Crowdfunding event does not have an agenda like the one published below, you might think twice before spending your hard earned dollars to attend their event.  There is nothing to be learned from rehashing last year’s news.

There is nothing unique about the Crowdfunding industry other than the fact that President Obama signed the JOBS Act  into law on April 5, 21012 with full bi-partisan support.

Crowdfunding portals are nothing more than an eCommerce center that allows entrepreneurs, startups and even existing small businesses to raise donations and collect money via a website. In fact, anyone with a WordPress website can download a Crowdfunding widget for around $99 and start raising money right now regardless of how long the SEC stalls the actual Equity Crowdfunding industry.

In fact, most people that are in the Crowdfunding industry have very little experience in running a real industry, which is why we created this trade show marketing template to show anyone, anywhere what most industries already know –  how to set up a national trade show event.

At the current time, Crowdfunding subject matter experts are charging $500 to $10,000 per speaking engagement plus travel expenses to share their twelve month’s of experience with naive people who want to learn more.  These subject matter experts have very little industry experience in talking about what really matters in building an industry-grade Crowdfunding platform, which is the underlying technology or marketing strategies that differentiate one platform over another.

Instead of inviting Crowdfunding executives for keynote and panel discussions, it would be a much wiser to decision to staff an industry Crowdfunding trade show and exhibition with high technology subject matter experts that can address how to set up an effective, yet safe Crowdfunding portal.

Learning how to setup a Crowdfunding portal with 99.999’s of reliability, security software applications that will protect their investors/Crowdfunders against fraud, business partner programs, Crowdfunding audit statements, call centers, cloud-based data centers, or network management facilities would be a much wiser investment for attendees that want to learn how to get into the Crowdfunding business.

For Crowdfunding campaign managers (Crowdfunders), Crowdfunding trade shows should provide an actual trade show floor that is full of Crowdfunding exhibitors such as platforms, portals and ancillary Crowdfunding Service Providers (CSPs) or full-service  PR firms that can help Crowdfunders execute targeted Crowdfunding marketing campaigns to make their Crowdfunding campaigns successful.

It would also been a great opportunity to introduce both Crowdfunding portals and Crowdfunders to licensed Broker Dealers with extensive SEC regulatory experience in order to help both parties structure Equity Crowdfunding portals or Crowdfunding campaigns to meet or beat any set of Crowdfunding guidelines that might be issued by the SEC in the very near future.  In fact, early leaders in the Equity Crowdfunding portal space are already actively raising equity investment capital for small businesses via accredited investors through traditional securities guidelines.

In order to attract speakers to a Crowdfunding event all that an event really needs is a Crowdfunding conference website that follows the guidelines below and that publishes a call for papers or presentations via a well written press release.

Aggressive PR professionals are always on the lookout for great events to place their executives for free speaking opportunities including keynote speeches, breakout sessions, panel moderators/members, tutorials and many other types of speaking/publicity opportunities.  These executives speak at events for free.

There are also numerous trade show portals that aggregate trade event information and publish the details via trade show directories.  Once listed, PR people are sure to begin pitching their executives to furnish free presentations on their expertise in return for the publicity and the free brand share awareness that these events generate for their companies.

This Crowdfunding Trade Show template is meant for executives at national trade show companies such Freeman, GES or Reed Exhibitions, that want to delve into putting together a large-scale, professional-grade Crowdfunding trade show, which is predicted to become a $300 billion industry.

Great targets for Crowdfunding trade show hosts would include IDG,  Tech Web, or Ziff-Davis publishing.

In fact, any industry trade publication, TV station or newspaper with more than 100,000 readers/viewers, should not only host a Crowdfunding event, but should also consider launching their own Crowdfunding portal to support their local community.

Collecting a five percent commission on all money raised is a prime opportunity for newspapers to not only add a badly needed revenue stream, but to help their local communities launch new businesses, which will provide a dramatic economic development stimulus package without incurring any new tax burdens for their citizens.  A typical Crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter is raising between $100,000 to $1,000,000.   Ten $1 million dollar campaigns per month equals around $6 million per year.

All high technology industry trade associations that host national trade shows should also include a low-cost Crowdfunding pavilion at their trade show events in order to educate their attendees as well as their exhibitors on how to use Crowdfunding to raise investment capital for existing and new startup businesses.  The more businesses that are launched, the more potential exhibitors will be at next year’s show!

Example National Crowdfunding Exhibition & Conference

1st Day Kickoff Event

9:00 am                Breakfast Keynote:   National Trade Show Executive Director

10:00 am             Kickstarter Presentation: Record Growth in 2012, Projections for 2013

11:00 am              IndieGoGo Presentation: Record Growth in 2012, Projections for 2013

12:00 pm              Lunch Keynote:  Financial Analyst –  Crowdfunding:  A $300 Billion Market Opportunity

Lunch Round Table Discussions:

Round top table discussions will be seated and grouped by industry segments, which will contain a table 20 subject matter experts including journalists, industry analysts, Crowdfunding Service Providers (CSPs) and successful Crowdfunding campaign managers for each business segment.

Many national associations won’t have a need for all of these industries, but these should give you a good idea of what is possible for most business-to-business associations on state-by-state basis:

Table   1:  Information Technology/Cloud Computing

Table  2:  Computer Networking/Telecom/ISPs

Table   3:  Security/Fraud Prevention

Table   4:  Games/Video Games/Smart Phone Apps

Table   5:  Film/TV/Entertainment

Table   6:  Music/Concert Venues

Table   7:  Art/Dance/Fashion/Theatre

Table   8:  Publishing/Comics/Books

Table   9:  Real Estate

Table 10:  Crowdfunding Service Providers

Table 11:  Gadgets/Gizmos

Table 12:  Bring Your Own Social Devices

Table 13:  VC/Angels/Financial Analysts

Table 14:  Adv/PR/Social Media/Email Marketing

Table 15:  Pres. Obama/Congress/SEC

Table 16:  Social Giving/Community Outreach

Table 17:  Bio Tech

Table 18:  Oil/Gas/Renewable Energy

3:00 pm               Crowdfunding Press Conference Example

Speakers:

1. Press Conference Moderator
2. Economic Development Official
3. Venture Capital
4. Licensed Broker Dealer
5. Perks-Based Crowdfunding Service Provider
6. Equity-Based Crowdfunding Service Provider

4:30 pm               Crowdfunding Service Providers/Venture Capitalists/Potential Crowdfunders Mixer

8:00 pm               Crowdfunding VIP Party Awards Dinner

1. MVP Award – Outstanding Crowdfunding Achievement
2. MVP Award – Fastest Crowdfunding Portal Growth
3. MVP Award – Best Business to Business (B2B) Portal
4. MVP Award – Best Business to Consumer (B2C) Portal
5. MVP Award – Best Social Community Outreach Portal

2nd Day Preliminary Breakout Sessions:

Welcome to the National Crowdfunding Exposition & Conference breakout session agenda, which will consist of moderated panel discussions covering the follow topics:

8:30 am        Continental Breakfast/Coffee Bar

9:00 am – 10:00 am        Breakout Session #1

CSP:  Rewards-Based Crowdfunding

Creative:  Games/Video Games/Smart Phone Apps

Financial:  Venture Capitalists

Technology:  Information Technology

Community:  Education

10:30 am – 11:00 am       Coffee/Bathroom Break

11:00 am – 12:00 pm      Breakout Session #2

CSP: Equity-Based Crowdfunding

Creative: Film/TV/Entertainment/Music

Financial: Angel Investors

Technology:  Security/Fraud Prevention

Community:  Emergency Relief

12:30 pm –  1:00 pm        Coffee/Bathroom Break

1:00 pm  – 2:30 pm        Breakout Session #3

CSP: Donation-Based Crowdfunding

Creative: Art/Dance/Fashion/Theatre

Financial: Financial Analysts

Technology:  Computer Networking/Telecom/ISPs

Community:  Churches/Houses of Faith

2:30 pm – 3:00 pm        Coffee/Bathroom Break

3:00 pm – 4:30 pm        Breakout Session #4

CSP: Create-Based Crowdfunding

Creative: Publishing/Comics/Books

Financial:  Real Estate

Technology: Gadgets/Gizmos

Community: Economic Development

Speakers Bureau:

Welcome to the National Crowdfunding Expo & Conference press room. All editors, reporters, successful crowdfunding campaign managers and industry analysts with press credentials will be allowed to attend this event for free as a VIP guest with access to all keynotes, breakout sessions .

Speakers need to submit high-res photo, 300-word biography and 800-word description what they would like present during keynote speeches, panel discussion and round table discussions. Deadline for submission is February 28, 2013. Click here to fill out the speaker request form.

Press Conference:

Press conference should look just like the one we did for the Crowdfund Texas Conference:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CEd2A2jXsAA

Only credential members of media will be allowed to attend.  The five speakers will make 5-minute comments on their vision for development of American Crowdfunding industry followed by short question and answer session.

Remote site reporters will be provided an audio bridge to listen in on the press conference and ask questions during the Q&A session via twitter by posting questions to @Crowdfunding_PR

Press Rooms:

Three quiet press areas will be available for PR people to reserve to conduct interviews with journalists on the National Crowdfunding Expo & Conference media list. There will be a small RSVP charge around ~$25.00 for 30 minutes to help pay for press room space to make sure rooms are used and are available on a first come, first served basis.

Press List:

Welcome to the National Crowdfunding Expo & Conference press list. All editors, reporters, successful Crowdfunding campaign managers and industry analysts with press credentials will be allowed to attend this event for free as a VIP guest with access to all keynotes, breakout sessions.

Press Kit Room:

All exhibitors will be allowed to provided printed materials for inclusion at the onsite press room as well as the virtual press room on the trade show website.

1. press releases
2. white papers
3. research studies
4. power point presentations
5. video clips
6. photos/logos
7. executive bios/head shots

Media Sponsorships:

Welcome to the trade show media sponsorship page.  All publications that list a short description of the on their publication’s event calendar and a logo with link back to trade show website will receive a receive a reciprocal mention on the trade show website and publication bins to provide bonus trade show distribution of their magazines to all attendees.  Magazine distribution sponsorship to attendees rooms is also available. Click here to download sponsorship opportunities.

Exhibitors:

Welcome to the National Crowdfunding Exposition & Conference exhibitor’s page.  All publications that list a short description of the Crowdfunding Expo on their publication’s event calendar and a logo with link back to trade show website will receive a receive a reciprocal mention on the trade show website and publication bins to provide bonus trade show distribution of their magazines to all attendees.  Magazine distribution sponsorship to attendees rooms is also available. Click here to register for an exhibit booth.

Front Page PR has helped setup many industry trade shows and would be happy to help anyone setup a national, regional or local Crowdfunding event. Please contact us for more details.

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