What to know:
- M&W Pro Audio, PCD, Planar, and USSI Global made personnel moves.
- Williams AV, Avocor, and others announced new partnership.
- The first-ever SCN Top Consultants guide dropped.
It was another busy week in Pro AV, but there was some big news right here at SCN. Not to toot our own horn, but this week launches the first-ever SCN Top Consultants 2026 list. This was a massive undertaking between the SCN team and Sean Wargo and Lee Dodson at Apogee Insight to bring you a list of more than three dozen specialists influencing Pro AV project specifications. We encourage you to take a look here.
[Nominations Open for Best in Market Pro AV 2026]
Now, on with the show.
People News
M&W Pro Audio Appoints Jay Schlabs as Chief Revenue Officer
M&W Pro Audio has appointed Jay Schlabs as chief revenue 0fficer. Schlabs brings more than two decades of leadership experience in professional audio, global sales strategy, channel development, and consumer products to the company as it prepares for the launch of its first generation of products.
Schlabs began his career in professional audio at Mackie Designs, where he served as national sales manager. He later joined inMusic Brands as executive director of sales, where he spent thirteen years leading global sales and marketing efforts across multiple professional audio brands. Most recently, Schlabs served as senior director of e-commerce at PetSafe Brands, where he spent nine years leading the company's e-commerce strategy and digital growth initiatives.
PCD Strengthens Engineering and Sales Teams
PCD added a pair of industry professionals to its growing team. Flynn Kelly, CTS, has joined as senior design engineer, while Rick Shaffer joined as design sales consultant serving the Greater Sacramento and Northern California region.
With more than 30 years of experience in audiovisual systems design, engineering and project delivery, Kelly brings extensive expertise designing enterprise-scale media networks and unified communications environments for corporate, education and commercial clients.
Prior to joining PCD, Shaffer served as a workplace life safety specialist at Accenture, where he managed access control initiatives, security operations and complex systems implementations while supporting the organization's North American ISO 27001 information security certification efforts. Earlier in his career, he led facilities and technology teams supporting large houses of worship, overseeing modern AV systems that included live production, streaming and lighting environments.
Planar Welcomed Will Lundy as Regional Account Manager for Southeast United States
Will Lundy has joined Planar as regional account manager for Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Based in Nashville, he is responsible for driving sales and supporting reseller partners and customers throughout the region.
Lundy has built a strong foundation in technical expertise, customer support, and sales through prior roles at Planar as an installation technician and sales development representative. His hands-on industry experience, Pro AV knowledge, and customer-focused approach make him a valuable resource for Planar partners and customers throughout the region.
USSI Global Promotes Abed Zein to Executive Leadership Role
USSI Global promoted Abed Zein to VP of revenue operations. In his new executive role, Zein leads initiatives focused on enhancing billing accuracy, delivering an exceptional customer experience, improving operational efficiency, and developing scalable processes that support USSI Global's continued growth strategy.
A member of the USSI Global team since 1995, Zein most recently served as senior director of operations, digital signage solutions. During his three decades with the company, he has led major customer programs spanning satellite communications, digital signage deployments, and managed services while building a reputation for operational excellence, customer satisfaction, and disciplined financial management.
Zein now oversee a growing team responsible for supporting billing accuracy, contract compliance, process automation and operational consistency across multiple business units. The centralized approach adds another layer of quality assurance to ensure projects are invoiced according to each customer's contractual requirements while improving efficiency for project management teams.
Partnerships
Avocor and NowSignage Announce New Strategic U.K. Partnership
Avocor announced a new strategic partnership with NowSignage, a cloud-based digital signage CMS provider. The initial focus for the partnership will be on the U.K. market, targeting sectors in which both brands operate, including education, enterprise, and retail.
NowSignage software is compatible with the newly launched Avocor B-Series and represents Avocor’s entry into the business and commercial digital signage display market. The collaboration also brings together two brands with strong roots in the U.K., the region that served as the founding market for Avocor a decade ago.
Alongside retail, as well as business signage and wayfinding in the enterprise sector, a key application for the partnership will be the growing need for campus-wide communication, lecture hall signage, and student information displays across U.K. higher education.
Avocor and NowSignage are also jointly committing to a commercial strategy that will combine resources and support sales channels, distributors, and integrators. Furthermore, the NowSignage software application can be loaded directly onto the Avocor B-Series with immediate effect.
Williams AV Expands Distribution in South Africa
Williams AV announced South African audiovisual distributor Audiosure as its newest international partner. By teaming up with Audiosure, Williams AV ensures that local systems integrators throughout South Africa have the expertise and support needed to deploy modern assistive listening technologies successfully.
"South Africa is an exciting market with 12 official languages and growing awareness around hearing accessibility, creating meaningful opportunities to improve inclusion in public spaces," said Per Persson, VP of international sales and product management at Williams AV. "Audiosure has a strong reputation in the AV industry and brings valuable local expertise and technical knowledge to this partnership. We're excited to work together to help venues across South Africa and neighboring countries deliver more accessible and inclusive audio experiences."
Company News
Chyron Introduces Virtual Placement 8.1
Chyron released Virtual Placement 8.1, the latest update in its live sports virtual graphics platform. Built to help broadcasters operate with greater confidence under live conditions, Virtual Placement 8.1 introduces workflow and graphics enhancements that make production more flexible, reliable, and efficient. The release focuses on smarter live workflows, stronger downstream reliability, broader line tracking stabilization, and a more integrated PRIME graphics experience within the platform.
With this release, operators gain greater control over chroma keying during live play, a new program-to-isolated camera comparison workflow for lower-latency calibrated feeds, expanded line tracking stabilization across more sports and venues, and smoother access to advanced PRIME graphics tools directly within Virtual Placement. Together, these updates help customers adapt faster on air, maintain cleaner and more stable virtual graphics, and streamline live production workflows.
LG Offers New B2B Financing Service
LG Electronics USA launched the LG Financing Referral Service, a new program designed to connect businesses with participating financial institutions that offer financing and leasing options for eligible LG commercial display solutions. This new B2B service aims to help organizations deploy display technology while managing their capital budgets through flexible payment structures.
Designed to provide commercial display customers with enhanced investment flexibility and access to new financing sources, the LG Financing Referral Service reduces upfront capital requirements and offers financing structures that align with operational and budgeting needs. The program supports projects across hospitality, retail, corporate workplaces and other commercial environments seeking to modernize customer and employee experiences through digital display technology.
The LG Financing Referral Service supports eligible commercial display deployments through participating financing providers and resellers. Program features include flexible financing models, predictable monthly payments, support for eligible LG solutions, integrated support and services, lease-end flexibility, and a third-party financing model.
Violet Audio Expands dMix 128 with Integrated MCP Server
Violet Audio has added a built-in Model Context Protocol (MCP) server to its dMix 128 Digital Mixer platform, further expanding the system’s ability to integrate with software applications, control systems, automation platforms, and emerging AI-assisted workflows.
Running directly within the mixer, the MCP server complements the dMix 128’s browser-based control architecture, OSC server, QRC/JSON control framework, AES67 networking, SMPTE ST 2110-30 support, and NMOS integration, creating a highly connected platform for modern audio environments.
