By Geoffrey Maingart

Santa Monica, CA(Hollywood Today)11/1/12/—OnHollywood 2012 taking place at the Museum of flying in Santa Monica continued for the second and final day with the best and brightest in the digital realm.  Sitting in the hall with amazing rare airplanes suspended above you was truly unique.  Tony Perkins, editor and founder of AlwayOn , www.aonetwork.com  has created this platform for the attendees to discuss the future of the digital world and the amazing entrepreneurs guiding the new directions in Silicon Valley and now the LA version, Silicon Beach.

Tuesday was very much about the chosen Top 100 companies honored here at the event.  All began with a networking breakfast and a chance to see the demo stations set up in the museum and the amazing new 84 inch 4K television by Sony (www.sony.com/4KTV). Sony also had on view a new 4K video camera there to check out.  The resolution of this television is astounding no matter how close you get to the screen.  The general comment was “mind blowing.”

Tony introduced speakers and the subject was Super Angels, Incubators & Accelerators – Who Has the Right Model?  Startups are the life- blood of the industry and the “incubator “ will put together a financial model that is workable and most startups will try then to raise about 200,000 in seed money, create the advisory board for the launch, gain traction and possibly later look for series A financing.  LA is the new Silicon Beach and many amazing concepts were actually invented here including “E-Mail.” Some companies that went on to become very successful started with as little as $20,000.  The word is Help entrepreneurs become successful.

What started in LA with about 40 companies has increased to 500 in seven years.  The challenge in LA is funding and too many companies and startups have had to look for investment outside the city.  Eventa is like a dashboard for all of the metrics and it produces a lot of the “noise” about companies.  Peter Pham of Science, Inc. built 9 venture-backed companies with $32 million raised.  Another important speaker was Howard Marks of Start Engine.  Invent Ventures and Io/LA also participated.  The role of the angel investor is important for startups and Silicon Beach is getting bigger as money frees up.  Our downtown has to develop and as all agreed, there will be blood, that is, failures.  This is all very Darwinistic and over funding is good for the industry.

The Mayor has created a council on Innovation and Industry with 25 top people providing a unique and diverse voice.  This council is concerned with all of the attributes that make LA the perfect center for innovation including the weather, diverse entertainment, being a global city and web content.  Challenges however include taxes, price, lack of venture capitol, policies that foster growth and incentives.  Their website is  www.LAMCII.org.
Los Angeles has the advantage of great universities, boundless talent, creativity, a wealthy market and is even now the 15th largest economy in the world as well as a small business capitol.

It was surprising to learn that the Internet began here and LA was the 1st node on the web.  Famous startups include Myspace, rent.com, PriceGrabber and 851 startup companies since 2005.

The next panel was devoted to the State of the Internet Video Revolution.  This included the CEO of Machinima, Allen DeBevoise, this year’s winner of the best company of the 100 top companies.  Also on the panel were the CEO’s of Ooyala, DECA, Everyday Health and WeVideo.  The discussion topics included YouTube, video for all devices, platforms, networks and anywhere/anytime video.  YouTube now has 2.2 billion views per month, a staggering number.  The main mobile audience is 13-17 years old.  The challenge is to build your brand.

Two companies were showcased, Lotto Stars and Gumiyo.  There was a roundtable discussion as to “What it Takes to be a Rising Star.”  We met the people behind GoPhoto, Style Hall, Funny or Die who all spoke of their rise and success.  Warren Buffet would usually ask people how they earned their first buck.  The hard road to success is surprising.  Apple began in 1976 and the Mac came in 1986 and made the cover of Time.  Funny or Die went from 0 to 3 million views per day in 3 days.  Now it is 2-3 million views.  Accelerators such as Amplify and raising money through networking on sites like MeetUp work.  Venture Capitol firms say no to 50% and then reject 95%.  One important advice to everyone was be prepared to talk about your exit strategy and enjoy fixing problems.

Focus on hiring talent and traction.  Love what you are doing and EXECUTE.  Set realistic milestones and as one of the greats, Steve Jobs said, “Get Shit Done.”

Tony Perkins introduced Phil Molyneux, President & COO of Sony Electronics who spoke and demonstrated the new technologies being created at Sony including the 84 inch 4K display with 4x HD resolution and internet enabled.  The 4K video camera was detailed.  He also showed a great trailer from Skyfall and awarded Tony with the new Experia smartphone.  We all then adjourned for a delicious box lunch break outside.

The afternoon session began with “Out of the Console and Onto the Internet – the Future of Gaming.”  The panel was hosted by Sean Manchanda of Bluewolf and included the directors of Activision, Salesforce, Pierre Wu who specializes in regulated online gaming, Bally Technologies and Valerie Red-Horse, owner and founder of Red-Horse Financial Group.
Poker is still the liquidity game but is successful with more people.  Social gaming through Facebook and sports games like fantasy football.  Understand that the gambling games are highly regulated and that gambling is entertainment.  Brands are important to get for the demographic.  The subject is daunting and led to the announcement of this year’s winner Machinima after a discussion of the Best and Brightest in digital Entertainment Platforms & Enablers.

Representatives of Microsoft, Samsung, Akamai and SCAYL spoke of optimizing all of the different devices and platforms to give the consumer the 2nd screen experience.  Adding life style content and smart glass capabilities and all of the different degrees of interactivity.  Also discussed was the idea of the x-box becoming the next network with 67 million units already in use.  Big files have to be broken into small bits to drive the new quality of content.  This was a great discussion hosted again by Tony Perkins, the creator of this whole event and CEO of AlwaysOn , www.aonetwork.com/ the company that was broadcasting this whole event live.  Again, all agreed that content and story was king and wins the mind share.

Last, Tony spoke of Digital Entertainment in the Cloud and the winner of the 100 Top Private Companies -  Company of the Year:  www.Machinima.com.  The winner was decided based on the following criteria:  Innovation, Market Opportunity, Commercialization, Stake Holder Value, Media Interest.  Allen DeBevoise accepted the award and explained that the company was founded in 2004 but really in 2008 and went from machine cinema to gaming.  The change in bandwidth has made more things possible.  Know when you have to pivot.  On demand video is changing the world.

The day ended for most with a reception.  Later that evening the top 100 companies and venture and capitalization people were invited to a fabulous dinner in Pacific Palisades at the Beverly Hills Bay Club.  I went with violin in hand and performed for all at the dinner.  This was a phenomenal 2 days and I cannot say enough about Tony Perkins and his team from AlwaysOn.  The company produces many events like this around the country and brings the most amazing people together to create the contacts, partnerships and think tanks that will set the direction for growth and change in this new digital world.