DSE Releases Initial Speaker Line-up For December 2024 Event In Las Vegas

April 26, 2024 by Dave Haynes

Questex, the industry events company behind Digital Signage Experience (DSE), has started marketing the 2024 versions set for early December in Las Vegas, announcing a set of speakers who will be in front of mikes for the education component of the show.

The speakers are vendors and end-users, and DSE says the intent is for them to share insights, real-world case studies and perspectives on digital experiences.

Speakers include:

• Jillian Austin, Director of Brand Partnerships, AREA 15;
• Rick Bauer, Global Director Customer Transformation, Sitecore;
• George Clopp, Chief Technology Officer, Korbyt;
• LaRissa Connett-Moore, Manager Customer Innovation & Strategy, United Airlines;
• Amahl Hazelton, Producer–Strategy & Development, Moment Factory;
• Charles Hong, Product Owner, United Airlines;
• Christine Latour, Chief Marketing & Communications Officer, Solotech;
• Joel Martin, VP, Programmatic Media, adFuze/chargeFuze;
• Brynn Pearson, Director, Digital & Omnichannel Customer Experience, Taco Bell;
• Jonathan Price, VP Sitecore Practice, Americaneagle.com;
• Tim Rowe, Host, OOH Insider;
• Mathieu St-Arnaud, Partner and Creative Director, Normal Studio;
• Marcos Terenzio, Senior Director, Digital Experience, IA Interior Architects;
• Albert Thompson, Managing Director, Digital, Walton Isaacson;
• Jackie Walker, Retail Experience Strategy Lead, North America, Publicis Sapient.

I like the focus on projects and creative, and the relative absence of vendors!

The education component of DSE, pre-COVID, was always a bit of an after-thought – with the main focus for most attendees being a busy and fairly substantial trade show floor. But genuine learning, along with networking, are now BIG parts of the re-booted, post-COVID event. The show is still 225 days out, so it is too early to get a true read, but right now the count of booked exhibitors on the DSE side of the show is less than 20. That will grow, of course, but this will be an exhibition more along the scale of the road shows some of the big pro AV distributors put on around the US and Canada.

The old DSE, at its peak in 2010s, was well north of 200 vendors. The difference now, in part, is that Questex co-locates DSE with another, kinda sorta related show LDI – which is all about live events and includes numerous LED display manufacturers and other tech like lighting, audio and sensory stuff that all feed into the big idea of experience. LDI has quite a big trade show floor, though just like ISE and InfoComm, there’s all kinds of stuff around LDI that has only tenuous or rare applicability to signage projects.

I think DSE attendance will be OK in December, regardless of however the digital signage-specific exhibitor count lands. The North American industry, as noted in the past, wants and needs a gathering. Digital signage is a big aspect of ISE and InfoComm, but they’re just one set of technologies among many at those much bigger shows. I can go to ISE and NOT see all kinds of industry friends. At a smaller show, there’s time and opportunity, and people looking to network are not finding themselves at parties and dinners with people who sell microphones, PTZ cameras or lighting trusses.

Genuinely good conference sessions helps – as no one is happy sitting down and realizing whoever has the mike is subtly or overtly doing a sales pitch. I know vendors are a bit conditioned to having microphone time at trade show conferences a bonus to their booked space commitment, but it is SUCH a bad look to sell and chest-beat when people have done the flight, paid the fees, turned up and sit down expecting to learn.

Here’s the agenda, which includes some LDI stuff. There is a reference to a Dec. 8 mixer, but that’s not going to be a Sixteen:Nine one, at least not one I can pull off. Our grandson Beau’s 3rd birthday is the 7th. Not missing that, and I’d have to if I wanted to be on the ground in Vegas and have an event ready to go two flights and four time zones away. I suspect Bryan Meszaros will do an XUSC event and that is already mentioned in the agenda.