Why did Vanu Bose use his first name to launch his company, Vanu Inc.?
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“Because my last name was already taken,” said the man whose father, Amar, started sound company Bose Corp. in 1964.
Vanu spent summers working at Bose on his way to bachelor’s degrees in electrical engineering and mathematics, a master’s in electrical engineering and a PhD in computer science.
“Then I rolled my thesis right into a company,” he said.
During the week, Bose leads his $5.9 million software company in creating code for wireless products like cell phones and hand-held devices.
But on Sundays–during football season–you can find the New England Patriots fan in front of his 55-inch rear-projection Mitsubishi HDTV.
The giant wide-screen set is connected to DirecTV (which beams every NFL game into Bose’s living room), a ReplayTV device (which records the games Bose wants to watch later) and his Dell PC (which uses the television as a computer monitor).
The feed is, of course, high definition.
“Football is spectacular in HD,” he said. “Because of the 16-by-9 [wide-screen] aspect ratio you actually see more of the field. You can see safeties lining up in the defensive backfield, and you don’t see that on a normal screen.”
High-definition programming is shot with special cameras that capture and transmit video in wide-screen format. Because of this, there is no picture distortion, or stretching, which is typical when normal programming is displayed on a wide screen.
Bose’s high-definition setup has had challenges.
“I have struggled mightily with the over-the-air HD signal,” Bose said. “That technology suffers greatly. They never should have approved it.”
Bose, who has an HD antenna on his porch, said most over-the-air signals suffer from a problem akin to older-generation antenna-based televisions.
“While the HD signal reaches my antenna, there are other signals bouncing off hills and things–and they reach me too. So depending on what station I want to watch, I have to open the screen door at just the right angle.”
He added that the HD signal will improve when it is consistently brought to homes by cable and satellite companies, rather than through the air.
But Bose said his HD effort is well worth it–especially with his New England Patriots about to play in the Super Bowl.
“The picture is amazing,” he said. “My friends walked in recently and their comment was, `This just doesn’t even look real.'”
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