Sporting Innovations changes name to FanThreeSixty, no news on lawsuit

Screen Shot 2016-01-21 at 9.14.29 PMKansas City-based sports app developer Sporting Innovations has changed its name to FanThreeSixty, a brand change for what the company calls the desire to create “a more direct connection to its award-winning FanThreeSixty platform.”

However, it’s also possible that the name change is part of a strategy to distance the company from an ongoing legal battle between current FanThreeSixty CEO and former Sporting Innovations CEO Robb Heineman and his former co-CEO Asim Pasha, which started when Sporting Innovations and Heineman filed a lawsuit against Pasha for allegedly conspiring to set up a competing firm using Sporting Innovations assets and intellectual property. That move was followed by Pasha filing counterclaims denying the company’s charges against him while also alleging that he was denied promised ownership stakes in the company for providing the technology behind its stadium-application business.

According to legal representatives for Pasha, the “name change has nothing to do with the lawsuit,” which, according to Pasha’s legal team and news reports, the is still ongoing and scheduled to be heard later this year. FanThreeSixty did not respond to requests for information or an interview about the press release.

So whatever the reason behind its name change, the company formerly known as Sporting Innovations is known primarily for being one of the first movers in the still-nascent field of integrated sports stadium apps, where functionality is designed to not only enhance the fan game-day experience but to also help the team or venue better capture marketing information from digital device use. The company was (and still is) joined at the hip with the Sporting Kansas City Major League Soccer franchise, which was one of the first teams to install Wi-Fi in its stadium and to embrace mobile-device usage by fans.

However, Sporting Innovations’ business of late has not provided much in the way of public customer wins, and several previous customers for the company’s Uphoria mobile device app platform have since dropped the product, including the Pac-12 and the Tampa Bay Lightning. While the Sporting Innovations site had until recently still included links to its Pac-12 and other previous customer wins, the new FanThreeSixty site has scrubbed all the old customer news and links from its site.

DISH Network and Disney deal boon to digital sports fans

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The Walt Disney Company, parent of ESPN, has reached a long term deal with DISH Network that will open up Disney content for broadcasting to DISH customers not just for television but also across multiple digital platforms.

The deal calls for the cancellation of all legal proceedings between the two parties as well as providing content to DISH subscribers. For sports fans this means access to established sports programming such as ESPN and ESPN2.

However new or just emerging channels will also be available to fans such as the soon to be launched SEC channel and the Longhorn Network as well. The deal for the SEC and Longhorn channel also enables DISH to provide these and other programming such as WatchESPN as a live and on demand digital stream to computers, tablets and smartphones using the DISH anywhere app.

However the digital portion of the deal requires that users subscribe to DISH Networks at a prescribed level in order to receive the services. Other properties such as Disney Junior, ABC Family, Disney Channel and Fusion also fall into the broadcast, live streaming category. There will also be expanded on-demand content availability including content from ESPN Deportes and from ESPN Films.

As the digital environment evolves, and most likely expands, going forward the deal has spelled out how they can go about taking advantage of this space. It provides a structure for other advertising models such as dynamic ad insertion and advertising on mobile devices.

Overall the deal will enable approximately 14 million satellite television viewers to have access to ESPN both on their televisions and as a second screen option going forward.

MLB, NFL team up to battle Aereo

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Live-TV startup Aereo has been taking on television broadcasters and winning but now faces an assault by two of America’s largest sports leagues, the NFL and MLB as they seek to prevent it from showing their broadcasts.

The two leagues are seeking to piggyback with an amicus brief to a petition filed by broadcasters that asks the United States Supreme Court to rule on the legality of Aereo’s broadcasting of local over the air signals.

In case you are unfamiliar with Aereo, it is a startup that makes a combination DVR/antenna that captures over the air broadcasts and allows customers to its $8 a month service to view the programming on Internet connected devices.

It started out in New York City last year and then moved to Boston and Atlanta, surviving legal challenges along the way. It has now accelerated its expansion efforts and recently moved into Utah, Chicago, Miami, Houston and Dallas this year.

Apparently this is terrible news to the sports leagues, as well as with NBC, Fox, ABC and CBS, the broadcasters that filed the initial suit. The broadcasters have claimed that Aereo is violating their copyrights and must pay retransmission fees.

The sports leagues have piled on claiming that if they lose exclusive retransmission licensing rights it will make over the air broadcasting less attractive and that they would be forced to go to paid cable networks. According to a piece in Variety the amount that the league collects is about $100 million for those rights.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out on a number of levels. Cable has been losing viewership as a generation of ‘cable cutters’ has emerged and they use Netflix and other online programs, get over the air antennas or do without.

Also the sports should keep boxing in mind. A once popular over the air sport it moved its premium events to pay per view cable, and helped kill the sport. While basic cable is not the same as PPV the example is one to remember.

The trend to get over the air broadcast, either from a service such as Aereo or by using a proxy, often illegal, appears to have accelerated the movement of quality content to basic cable where it is much more difficult to rebroadcast. Will sports follow this trend?

Friday Grab Bag: SensoGlove wins award, Nike+ grows

The Nike+ Fuel Lab, the recent expansion of Nike’s effort to get a larger body of developers working on its Nike+ technology has started to invite a select group of tech companies to work with it on the platform.

The 2014 Nike+ Fuel Lab in San Francisco is a 12-week program for which the company said it will select 10 companies to partner with it in developing apps. Among the resources it will provide are access to Nike+ and NikeFuel APIs and SDKs, work space and mentorship a well as $50,000. Send in your application now!

Patent trolls under attack in Congress
Companies that are fighting patent trolls, individuals or corporations that file frivolous patent infringement lawsuits may have a new, potent tool in the defensive arsenal as the U.S. Congress may consider a bill intended to curb such behavior.

Introduced by Bob Goodlatte, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee one aspect of the law would be that winners would receive fees from the loser unless the loser had a ‘substantially justified’ position.

Baseball teams worth more than you thought
Bloomberg News spent nine months working out how valuable each Major League Baseball franchise was by looking at all forms of revenue and came to the determination that the teams have been undervalued by an average of 35%.

The team that came out on tops was the New York Yankees, pegged at $3.2 billion. In the breakdown it shows that the teams’ regional sports network accounts for almost $1 billion of that value, or more than many of the bottom teams totals.

Sensoglove wins Tech award
Sensosolutions digital golf glove, SensoGlove, has won Golf Magazine’s 2013 Techy Award as announced in the publication’s November 2013 issue. The Techy Awards cover 20 different categories that span all aspects of the game of golf.

So it’s not a surprise that the category that the SensoGlove won was Techiest Glove. The glove is filled with sensors that help you adjust your grip by position and power so that your hands are in the correct place and exerting the right amount of pressure.

Web connected video devices to outnumber world population soon
If it seems that everyone next to you at a sporting event is using their camera, tablet or heaven forbid, camera to take still images and video to put onto social media you are not far off. According to a recent study by market research firm HIS, as reported by Home Media Magazine, devices may outnumber humans soon.

The study estimated that by 2017 the total installed base of Internet-connected devices that can play video is expected to reach hit 8.2 billion a 90% increase from the 4.3 billion that is estimated to be connected by this year’s end. The planet’s population in 2017 is estimated at 7.4 billion.

Mobile Sports Report TechWatch: Happy Cyber Monday

Apple is seeking to keep the pressure on Samsung in the legal game and this week has extended its infringement motion against Samsung to now include the Galaxy S3 Mini, the Galaxy Note 2, the Galaxy Tab 2 10.1, the Galaxy Tab 8.9 and the Rugby Pro according to TechRadar.

The move looks to be in retaliation for a similar push by Samsung which has added Apple’s iPad Mini and iPhone 5 to a list of devices that it claims infringe on its patents.

Tablet shipments top laptops in October
You knew that the day when tablets would pass PCs was coming, but there had been estimates that it would not occur for some time. Apparently those predictions were wrong. According to market research firm NPD Display Search, tablet sales passed laptop sales last month, based on its following of the panels used in both products. In October there was an estimated 16.9 million notebook panels shipped while there was an estimated 18.7 tablet panels shipped. However this may be a one month blip as the researchers also said that there were many notebook buyers holding back until after Windows 8 shipped.

Instagram rules on Thanksgiving
This is probably a no-brainer out there for most people but Thanksgiving was Instagram’s biggest day ever. The photo imaging service reported that it averaged 226 photos posted per second over a 24-hour period, with a total of 10 million photos shared over Thanksgiving. That is a lot of turkey. Or a lot of turkey pictures, anyway.

Microsoft planning a set-top box?
According to the Verge, Microsoft has an Xbox TV in the works that it has slated for release sometime in 2013. The device will enable streaming video as well as serve as a platform for the casual gamer, according to the article.

Most likely to be release roughly a year from now it will represent a two SKU strategy for Microsoft in the Xbox space with a dedicated Xbox that supports higher end games and the TV/Xbox combo for the everyday user.

Motorola repeats request for Apple Source Code
As part of one of its lawsuits against Apple, Motorola Mobility has requested access to Apple’s source code. Five times now, but who is counting? Motorola made the first request last May according to a story in the Inquisitr, and has now just made its fifth.

The case is being heard by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The request is for the source code for both the Mac OS X and iOS and Motorola is also asking for a specific date from Apple on when it plans to hand over the code.

Kickstarter kicked
Kickstarter launched a bit over a month ago in the United Kingdom and it now looks like one of is first projects is going to cause the crowdfunding site a few headaches. A successful funding effort landed a startup called Formlab over 2 million pounds.

Birthed from MIT’s Media Lab, Formlab is developing a 3D printer, however 3D Systems, a maker of 3D printers is claiming patent infringement and has sued the startup, as well as Kickstarter. The issue is over how a laser causes a synthetic substance to solidify as part of the 3D process.

According to a piece in PC Adviser, Kickstarter is also being sued by a rival crowd funding company called ArtistShare over the use of a database software program and how it can be used.

Mobile Sports Report TechWatch: Microsoft Phone Issues

A week after Apple settled its patent dispute with HTC it looks like another of its long-running patent battles may be coming closer to a solution. Bloomberg has reported that Apple is now interested in settling its disputes with Google’s Motorola Mobility unit via arbitration.

The effort could lead to the elimination of all of their legal wrangling that is now taking place in courts around the globe. The two have been exchanging proposals for using binding arbitration to settle the problems, it was reported.

Samsung seeks Apple/HTC info
Not all good things have sprung from last week’s patent deal between Apple and HTC. Samsung, still involved in some bitter patent disputes globally with Apple is now seeking to have the courts provide it with the details of the Apple/HTC deal.

Samsung is arguing that the deal shows that Apple is quite willing to forgo the exclusivity that its designs provide if it receives cash in exchange, according to a piece in Computerworld. In related news about the ongoing Apple/Samsung lawsuits the U.S. District judge who presided over Apple’s huge victory over Samsung is expected to rule in December on Apple’s request for a permanent ban on select Samsung products.

Amazon’s 8.9-inch Kindle HD ships early, New Nexus 7 also available
Amazon is set to please the advance buyers of its Kindle HD by shipping the tablet five days earlier than expected. However the joy could be short lived as it looks as if demand has outstripped supplies and the next batch of the tablets will not ship until early December.

The Nexus Seven with 3G also now available and Google is telling customers that it will be three to five business days to receive the tablet.

Windows phone from Microsoft on the way?
The rumor drumbeat continues to grow that Microsoft has another hardware product in the works and that it will be a smartphone for Windows 8. Not sure if it is just one rumor that continually gets picked up and forwarded or if there are a number of independent sources reporting this but it does make sense. It is already competing with its hardware OEMs in the tablet space, why not in the smartphone space as well?

However all is not good with Windows 8 OS
Slash Gear is reporting that users of Windows 8 Phone are reporting a variety of battery and other issues with phones running the operating system. Among the issues are the phones just randomly rebooting while being used. Also poor battery life has been reported on a forum called WPCentral.

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