INTERVIEW: RONNI GUGGENHEIM, BARIX Signage that’s really saying something
A highly regarded pioneer of digital signage technology during his Minicom years, Ronni Guggenheim is now spearheading its convergence with audio as the CEO of Barix AG. David Davies spoke to him about the IP specialist’s groundbreaking new Audio Signage range
Last year marked a distinct departure in your career, when after many years in leading digital signage roles you went to work for audio over IP specialist Barix. But what would you identify as the milestones of previous career? The previous 15 or so years of my career were spent helping to pioneer the digital signage scene. It’s a process that really began in the late ’90s when I was running Minicom Digital Signage and it started to become clear quite how much potential there was in this market. The momentum picked up even further when Minicom merged with another leading digital signage specialist, EnQii, forming ComQi in 2011. I was closely involved with making that deal happen. Not long afterwards, I decided that it was time for a change so I opted to go it alone and became an independent management consultant. That period lasted around
two-and-a-half years, during which time I advised a variety of technology companies about how to drive their growth. It’s in that area, of driving expansion, that I think I have my greatest strengths. Then, last year, I decided that I had had enough of consultancy and wanted to go back to building up one brand again. Fortunately, at around the same time, I happened to have a conversation with my old friend, [Barix founder and then-CEO] Johannes Rietschel…
It was a conversation that ultimately led to you taking over as CEO in September last year. But did the move from digital signage into audio constitute a big culture shock? I am a firm believer that there is no such thing as coincidence in life! For me, it was great timing as I was keen to identify another challenge, while Johannes [who is still closely involved with Barix as its chairman] wanted to push the company to the next stage. As for culture shock, well,
not really as it has been my observation for some time that the two worlds of
22 July 2014
audio and digital signage are getting closer together. It was apparent to me that a convergence between these two segments was on the cards, but that it needed a driving force to help make it happen. This is something that Barix has helped to encourage over the last year- and-a-half and which has now resulted in the Barix Audio Signage range.
For the uninitiated, in a nutshell, what is the USP of
Barix Audio Signage? By synchronising very high- quality audio with video signage content, it’s designed to give screens a ‘voice’ in retail shops and everywhere else you might encounter one. Using our embedded audio streaming technology, a Barix Instreamer encodes and delivers high-quality, low- latency audio streams to WiFi access points. Consumers can then access the stream using the Barix Audio Point smartphone app, while
there is also the option for consumers to scan a QR code to activate the streaming app on the smartphone. Another newly announced solution is Soundscape, an audio-centric CMS system driving in-store radio and background music networks. Soundscape is a Cloud-based software solution that allows the user to direct the audio stream to the right place, at the right time and in the right quality. The Cloud-based platform makes it easy to
monitor and manage devices across multiple locations, handling everything from troubleshooting to device configuration and software updates. It also makes it very easy to achieve seamless switching between live streams and stored playlists, which gives users more flexibility in managing network bandwidth and/or special content. It is my view that historically the industry of digital signage has in many
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‘Historically... digital signage has... pulled back from audio; not because it did not ‘make sense’, but because it did not know how to deal with it’
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