WATCH: 5 Minute CTV Reality Check - Origin CEO Fred Godfrey Talks Creative AI and Why The Time Is 'Now' For Connected TV.

As you will see in the video below, 5 minutes on stage isn’t much time - unless you use it to say the quiet part out loud.

During a live interview with Breaking & Entering Media at TVOT NYC 2025, Origin’s Fred Godfrey didn’t bother with the usual conference pleasantries. No buzzword bingo. No “we’re excited to announce.” Just a clear-eyed take on where streaming actually is right now - and why, for the first time in a long time, that’s worth being optimistic about.

Godfrey opened with a familiar choice anyone who’s ever stepped onto a panel knows well: be honest, or talk nonsense. His preference is well-documented. People don’t show up to industry conferences to hear polished corporate scripts - they come to learn one real thing. And increasingly, the rooms that matter are rewarding honesty over diplomacy.

The most surprising moment? When asked about his biggest current challenge, Godfrey paused - and realized he didn’t have a reflexive answer. After six years running Origin (and more than a decade in connected TV before that), this was new territory.

That doesn’t mean everything’s perfect. It means something more interesting: the pieces are finally in place. Measurement, distribution, creative tooling - many of the things the industry has spent years complaining about are actually here. The problem isn’t capability anymore. It’s energy. Too much of it is still being wasted on complaining instead of building.

That idea carried straight into Godfrey’s take on AI - one of the few moments at TVOT where the conversation moved past hype. At Origin, AI isn’t the idea machine. It’s the enabler. Humans still come up with the story; machines just make it possible to execute at a scale that would’ve been laughable five years ago.

One example: a recent retail campaign that ran over 5,000 creative variations in the living room over four days. The human idea stayed intact. The robots did the heavy lifting. Without AI, that level of creative enrichment would’ve taken hundreds of people centuries to complete. With it, the team could spend more time on what actually matters - the idea itself.

What gave Godfrey real hope at TVOT wasn’t just better tools, but a cultural correction. The industry flirted briefly with the notion that AI could replace creativity entirely. In Fred's opinion, that risk that this became 'the only way' for anyone or anything being created passed. What’s emerging instead is a healthier tension - one that recognizes emotion, storytelling, and love as the real economic engine behind every paycheck in the room.

The future, as Godfrey sees it, isn’t humans versus machines. It’s humans freed by machines - to think bigger, push further, and finally stop pretending that automation was ever the point.

Here is how that 5 minutes went:

If you find this topic interesting and would like to know more, you can schedule a consultation with one of Origin's CTV specialists by clicking here.

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ABOUT ORIGIN

Origin is a multi-award winning provider of creative solutions and services for media buyers, creative teams and brands who want to transform conventional CTV ad creatives into powerful, personal and provocative advertising experiences.

With unparalleled creative capabilities and proprietary ad serving technology, Origin’s unique suite of dynamic ad overlays and native CTV ad extensions allows advertisers to

engage distracted audiences and achieve the results they need.

Founded by media veterans Stephen Strong and Fred Godfrey, Origin is driven by the belief that winning viewers today requires breaking free from how it was done yesterday.

Learn more at: originmedia.tv