Keynote Speaker
Eric Rodli
Executive Vice President & General Manager of Entertainment
Macrovision
Blair Westlake
Corporate Vice President, Media & Entertainment Group
Microsoft Corporation
Featured Speakers
Tom Adams
President
Adams Media Research
Chris Armstrong
Founder & CEO
PortoMedia
Richard Atkinson
VP Global Anti-Piracy Strategy & Operations
The Walt Disney Studios
Anthony Bay
Executive Chairman/Co-Founder
Mod Systems
Jonathan Bender
Senior VP of Operations and Digital Media,
Concord Music Group
Jim Bottoms
Co-Managing Director
Understanding and Solutions
Benn Carr
VP of New Technology
The Walt Disney Studios
Todd Collart
Senior Vice President New Technology
Deluxe Digital Studios
Stephen Condon
Vice President, Worldwide Marketing, Broadband Content Services
VeriSign
Sven Davison
Vice President Content Development & Production
Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment
Don Eklund
EVP Advanced Technologies
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Jeff Fochtman
Sr. Marketing Manager Worldwide Consumer Electronics
Seagate Technology
Joseph A. Grasso
Manager, Graphics & Marketing Services, Americas Consumer Brands
Imation Corp.
Dave Hoffman
Vice President
Nielsen Home Entertainment
Stephan Hotz
Head of Product Management Optical Disc
Singulus Technologies
Toshio Koike
Senior Corporate Advisor
Marubeni Techno-Systems America
Van Ling
DVD/Blu-ray producer, visual effects supervisor, consultant and digital artist
Bill Mandel
Vice President, Broadband Technology
Universal Pictures Digital Platforms, a division of NBC Universal
Bob Michaels
Vice President, Worldwide DVD
Technicolor Creative Services
Michael Mitchell
Executive Vice President and General Manager
Sony DADC
Spencer John Mott
Director of International Security and Risk Management
Electronic Arts (EA)
Tim Napoleon
Chief Strategist, Media and Entertainment
Akamai Technologies
Todd Rosenbaum
Founder and CEO
Polar Frog Digital
Dr. Leonhard Schwab
Co-founder, CTO and Managing Director
dr.schwab Inspection Technology
Marianne Sernevi
Executive Vice President Optical Media
AudioDev AB
James Steynor
CEO DaTARIUS Group
DaTARIUS Technologies Ltd.
Kurt Webster
Director Architecture: Digital Content Group
SanDisk
Blair Westlake
Corporate Vice President, Media & Entertainment Group, Microsoft Corporation
As corporate vice president of the Media & Entertainment Group at Microsoft Corporation, Blair Westlake serves as the liaison within Microsoft for the media and entertainment industries, including Hollywood, broadcasters, cable/satellite programmers and the music industry. He directs a cross-organizational group responsible for business development, policies and content licensing for services and products including Xbox Live® Marketplace Video store, Windows® Media Center Edition PCs and Zune®. He joined Microsoft in August 2004 and is based at the Company’s Redmond, WA headquarters.
Westlake is a seasoned media and entertainment industry veteran, with more than 25 years of diverse experience encompassing home video, pay and free television distribution, video-on-demand and pay-per-view, non-theatrical content distribution (airlines, hotels, etc.), television production, physical studio operations, international thematic channels development and management, strategic planning for a global television business unit, magazine publishing and theme parks.Before joining Microsoft, Westlake consulted for various media companies including Comcast Corp. and NBC Universal and was corporate executive vice president of Gemstar-TV Guide International, Inc. Westlake was also an executive of Universal Studios, Inc. (formerly known as MCA INC.) for nearly 20 years, where he was Chairman of Universal Television & Networks Group. He joined Universal as an attorney in the Law Department (1982 - 85), and subsequently held positions as Director of Business Affairs for Studio Operations (1985-87), Vice President and Senior Vice President, Business & Legal Affairs, Home Entertainment Group (1987-93), Executive Vice President, Home Entertainment Group (1993-96), and President, Worldwide Pay Television and Television Business Development (1996-97). Following graduation from law school, he was an attorney with Great Western Financial Corporation, later acquired by Washington Mutual Bank.
Under Westlake’s leadership, Universal Studios broke new ground in creating strategic alliances to build the Universal brand in the global television arena, including long-term, multibillion dollar channel carriage and content licensing agreements with Germany’s KirchGruppe, France’s Canal+, Stream in Italy and Sogecable in Spain. He was instrumental in the formation of various multi-party joint ventures, leading to the creation of a dozen international channels including HBO Asia, Telecine premium movie channel in Brazil, Cinecanal premium movie channel in Latin America, the Premium Movie Partnership (Showtime and Encore movie channels) in Australia, TV1 Channel in Australia, RTL7 channel partnership (with CLT/UFA and Bertelsmann) in Poland, and Star Channel in Japan.
Westlake oversaw the global of the licensing of Universal’s motion pictures (output and library comprising 5,000+ titles) and television libraries (40,000+ episodes), through all forms and means of television. In 1993, Westlake negotiated a groundbreaking agreement with Tele-Communications Inc. and Encore Media for Universal Studio’s motion pictures, which led to the formation of what later became known as Starz, a premium movie channel which competes with HBO and Showtime. In 2000, he was responsible for crafting and negotiating the first-ever “split-slate” output deal with HBO and Starz.
A recognized leader in the media and entertainment industries, Westlake was the first recipient of the Whittier College School of Law Alumni Award for Business Excellence in 2002, and in December 2007 received the Special Founders Award from the Association of Media and Entertainment Counsel (AMEC), the leading trade association serving general counsel and business affairs attorneys at media and entertainment companies.
He is a member of a number of industry organizations including The Paley Center for Media (The Museum of Television & Radio) Media Council, the Executive Branch of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (Academy Awards®), Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (Emmy Awards®), the Executive Committee of the International Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (iEmmy® Awards) and The Pacific Council on International Policy. Westlake is a member of Board of Directors of the Digital Entertainment Group (DEG); ContentGuard, Inc.; and Digital Coast Roundtable; he is a former member of the Consumer Electronics Association Board of Directors and the Board Industry Leaders and board of the National Association of Television Program Executives (NATPE).
Westlake is admitted and an active member of the California State Bar.
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