Thursday, February 26

Chopin

From casual to fully immersive games, brands and developers have been tapping into this type of content to extend properties into the digital landscape for some time—especially in the kids space. But renowned digital designer and gaming entrepreneur Nicholas Fortugno contends that games of all shapes and sizes have far more potential as a part of a brand's lifecycle than what's currently being exploited. As our iKids keynote speaker, he’ll explore how brands can more fully experiment and innovate with games to drive engagement, and work cost-effectively to get the most out their relationships with developers. 

Featuring:

Nicholas Fortugno
Co-Founder & CCO
Playmatics

Chopin

With kids all around the world virtually living on their mobile devices now, our seasoned panel of pros will explore how this shift in digital consumption is challenging the way we design entertainment experiences for kids, sharing their lessons learned about going mobile, and also postulating on what’s in store for us in this critical content stream.  

Featuring:

David Kleeman
SVP, Global Trends
PlayCollective

Chris Bishop
Senior Creative Director
PBS KIDS

Dylan Collins
CEO
SuperAwesome

Darran Garnham
Chief Commercial Officer & President of Entertainment
Mind Candy

Jon Mason
Founder & Managing Director
Jollywise Media Ltd

Chopin

Working with neuroscience lab CorTechs' brainwave-reading software and VBOT’s mobile-centric video platforms, Ireland’s Kavaleer will hit the main stage at iKids to unveil Dougie Noir, a new brain-controlled game that tracks a player’s neural activity in real time with a Bluetooth headset, and then throws tailored content with assistive technology into the game experience. Talk about mind-bending!

Featuring:

Áine Behan
CEO and Co-Founder
Cortechs Ltd

Andrew Kavanagh
CEO & Founder
Kavaleer Productions

Chopin

The digital space is constantly changing the way today’s kids play, learn and grow. And while it’s a mistake to make light of the important opportunities that digital experiences create―for kids and for brands―it’s critical to check our assumptions with information and insights that come from kids and families themselves. In this presentation, we’ll share the most important digital myths that need busting, and the keys to authentically connecting with this audience.

Featuring:

Amy Henry
President
C + R Research Services Inc

Chopin

In the Learning Games Lab at New Mexico State University, Barbara Chamberlin has developed a methodology for repeatedly testing digital products for kids with little stress and frequent access to users. She’ll share some of these techniques at iKids, and outline processes that can be easily integrated into any team’s development cycle. 

Featuring:

Barbara Chamberlin
Director, Game Development & Research
New Mexico State University, Learning Games Lab

Chopin

As Albert Einstein famously said: “I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.” But what is curiosity, and what is its evolutionary role in shaping how young minds learn and grow? Thanks to recent studies, we can start to understand exactly how curiosity and wonder manifest within the brain in terms of biological and sensory systems, information processing and memory, creativity, innovation and learning. This session explores these exciting new discoveries and how to apply them to unlock the unique potential of each early learner.

Featuring:

Carla C. Christensen
Director, Product Management for Early Education
Houghton Miffin Harcourt

Chopin

At 11 years old, Zach Marks set out to create his own social network. Financed with a US$2,500 loan from his big brother, Gromsocial has attracted more than 650,000 subscribers in just three short years. Join Zach in a rare one-on-one chat about his lightbulb moment and why he thinks kids are looking for something different in social media. We guarantee you will leave feeling inspired by the next generation of digital kids. 

Featuring:

Zach Marks
Founder, Creator
Grom Social Inc

Jeremy Dickson
Features & Special Projects Editor
Kidscreen

Chopin

Grover's Block Party is a brand-new way of playing and learning for preschoolers that combines real-world alphabet block play with augmented reality and multi-screen functionality that lets Grover organically react to and comment on how kids are playing in real time. Don’t miss Noah Harlan from Two Bulls (which developed the app with Sesame Workshop) as he lays out the approach to this massive project and demonstrates how the partners came together to create such a new and innovative format. 

Featuring:

Noah Harlan
Founder/Partner
Two Bulls

Chopin

In this session, PlayKids' Head of Worldwide Content Bethany Gorfine will share lessons she gleaned while developing and distributing a new platform with a unique business model that went against the norm to become one of the top-grossing iOS apps in the Kids category.

Featuring:

Bethany Gorfine
President & CEO
Federal Hill Communications

Chopin

Kids entertainment expert Dubit takes a look at how the new age of virtual reality is poised to change not just games, but all forms of kids media. Dipping into its proprietary research, Dubit will dish on what VR means for animation, gameplay, narrative and live-action formats, and what you can do now to prepare.

Featuring:

Bobby Thandi
Founder and CEO
Dubit

Chopin

Cartoon Network is the first TV brand to debut a micro-network in app form. Revolutionary in concept, Cartoon Network Anything serves up its original short-form content in a random, almost roulette-like way that's constantly refreshed. This session will walk you through the decision-making and design process behind building CN's smallest network. 

Featuring:

Beau Teague
VP, Product Management
Cartoon Network

Chopin

This session will walk you through the design process the creator of award-winning tech toys, Tiggly Shapes and TigglyCounts, uses to build tech toys that interact with learning apps engineered to encourage a generation of “stretchy learners” who make mistakes, take risks, and learn more each day. Jamalian, co-founder and chief learning officer of Tiggly, will also discuss the findings of a new study, conducted by the independent research firm PlayCollective, that examined learning and engagement outcomes for four- and five-year-old children who played the company's learning apps with and without Tiggly Counts.

Featuring:

Azadeh Jamalian
Co-Founder & Chief Learning Officer
Tiggly

Chopin

Why did Coolabi take the path less travelled and move Beast Quest from books to mobile, rather than from books to TV? Head of Digital Naomi Dare lays out the company’s roadmap for the property and shares why her team challenged the natural publishing order. 

Featuring:

Naomi Dare
Director of Digital
Coolabi Group

Chopin

To cap off iKids 2015, we're bringing together six digital media pros who live on the bleeding edge of innovation to talk us through the things they're excited about, and what it all means for our industry. Each speaker will walk through 20 slides that automatically advance every 16 seconds, guaranteeing this can't-miss session will be informative, fun, and probably over way too fast!

Featuring:

Laurent Mascherpa
Co-Founder & CEO
Floop Technologies

Amy Friedman
Founder & President
Senior Advisor, MTV Scratch

Trevor Lai
CEO & Creative Director
UP Studios

Joe Shochet
Co-Founder
codespark

Barbara Chamberlin
Director, Game Development & Research
New Mexico State University, Learning Games Lab

Dylan Collins
CEO
SuperAwesome

Jason Loftus
Director/Producer
Mark Media

Trade Room

What could be better than unwinding over cocktails at the end of iKids? Unwinding over cocktails AND nerding out with some awesome new tech! Join us in our Demo Den and get an up-close-and-hands-on look at some of the gadgets and projects featured in our conference program! 

Featuring:

Joe Shochet
Co-Founder
codespark

Andrew Kavanagh
CEO & Founder
Kavaleer Productions

Áine Behan
CEO and Co-Founder
Cortechs Ltd

Noah Harlan
Founder/Partner
Two Bulls

Jon Howard
Executive Product Manager
BBC

Bobby Thandi
Founder and CEO
Dubit