CES Unveiled: Media Gets an Early Peek at Show Innovators

CES Unveiled is the first chance for press and industry analysts to get a look at some of the exhibitors that will be on the CES 2020 show floor when it opens on Tuesday, January 7. Approximately 240 companies demonstrated their products related to smart homes, digital health, gaming and all manner of innovation. At the end of the session of CES 2020 trends, CTA vice president Steve Koenig noted that products aimed at sustainability will also make an impact at the show, particularly at Eureka Park, home to startups. Continue reading CES Unveiled: Media Gets an Early Peek at Show Innovators

CES 2020: How Keynotes Will Impact the 2020 Conversation

Are CES keynote presentations and conference programs a crystal ball to the future? Do they shape the conversation and influence the trends that will ultimately emerge from the annual tech and innovation gathering that begins this Sunday, January 5 in Las Vegas? Or are they a calculated mix of corporate hype and politics supporting the agenda of the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), owner of CES? In our experience at CES, especially the most recent years, the answer tends to be all of the above. The keynote lineup is remarkable this year for what is not on the stage as much as who is. The new decade dawns with an emphasis on ways to apply technology and innovate on the advances predicted for the past 20 years. Continue reading CES 2020: How Keynotes Will Impact the 2020 Conversation

$3 Billion TiVo-Xperi Merger Is All About the Patent Portfolio

Rather than splitting itself into separate product and IP businesses as it explored earlier this year, Rovi-owned TiVo is merging with Xperi Corporation in a deal valued at $3 billion. San Jose-based TiVo, a pioneer in the DVR industry, licenses its IP for areas involving digital rights management, electronic program guides and metadata. Xperi, also with headquarters in San Jose, is a tech licensor in areas including mobile computing, data and memory storage and 3D integrated circuits. The deal will integrate TiVo and Xperi’s IP licensing and product businesses, which will then operate as separate units so that one could be sold in the future. Continue reading $3 Billion TiVo-Xperi Merger Is All About the Patent Portfolio

CES: 5G and the Internet of Things Take First Steps – Part 2

Yesterday we noted that recent years have seen the Internet of Things and next-generation 5G networks evolving on parallel tracks. From autonomous vehicles to smart factories and wearables, 5G promises to super-charge speed, low latency and reliability. As carriers begin to introduce 5G networks, and we gear up for next month’s CES in Las Vegas, it’s time to check-in about the state of the relationship between these two technologies. Today, we’ll address the convergence of 5G and IoT in the enterprise space. Continue reading CES: 5G and the Internet of Things Take First Steps – Part 2

CES: 5G and the Internet of Things Take First Steps – Part 1

For several years, the Internet of Things (IoT) and next-generation 5G networks have been evolving on parallel tracks. From autonomous vehicles to smart factories and wearables, 5G promises to super-charge speed, low latency and reliability. As carriers begin to introduce 5G networks, it’s time to check-in about the state of the relationship between these two emerging technologies. We anticipate both to make a major splash at CES in Las Vegas this January. Today, we’ll look at creating applications for existing and new networks. Tomorrow, we’ll address the convergence of 5G and IoT in the enterprise space. Continue reading CES: 5G and the Internet of Things Take First Steps – Part 1

CES: Expectations for the Immersive Experience Landscape

When CES 2020 opens on January 7th in Las Vegas, I expect experiences — of which ‘entertainment’ is one option — will be center stage. We will be watching for repositioning of products and services as experiences, as well as for new ideas for experiences themselves. To state the obvious, for mixed reality and immersive experiences to work well, the user experience (UX) should be intuitive and match user expectations. Companies are working to achieve this by dealing in their own individual ways with the convergence of multisensory, multiplatform, immersive media technology and language (VR, AR, MR, XR); AI; 5G; IoT; robotics and autonomous things; and blockchain. Gartner describes this as a shift from technology-literate people to people-literate technology. Continue reading CES: Expectations for the Immersive Experience Landscape

CES: Streaming Digital Citizenship as a Societal Experiment

After years of development, direct-to-consumer streaming is poised to actively provide new choices for how the world consumes entertainment content. While it started as a response to the one-size-fits-all model offered by cable companies, it now offers choice of separate walled gardens, each with a different gate. Aggregators in the streaming space are quickly bulking up to what traditional providers charge based on the cost of channel acquisition. To some consumers this will seem like déjà vu. Others will choose carefully among the direct offerings to customize the content entering their world.  Continue reading CES: Streaming Digital Citizenship as a Societal Experiment

CES: Anticipating New Era of Streaming Digital Citizenship

It’s almost a new year and a whole new crop of technology is about to introduce a phase change into our collective psyche. It’s time to reflect before we dive into the shameless and enthusiastic possibilities it portends. Let’s take a moment to muse about our new realities. With 5G no doubt to be pervasive at CES 2020 next month, some of the new effects of the streaming marketplace will soon be apparent to the consumer. As each entertainment giant introduces new streaming services at what appears to be astounding value, when cobbled together they increasingly grow to approximate a consumer’s old aggregated service bill from a cable provider.  Continue reading CES: Anticipating New Era of Streaming Digital Citizenship

The Human Interface: What We Expect From AI at CES 2020

We’re not going to lie: the annual “heads up CES” piece on artificial intelligence is a major exercise in hit or miss. This is because technology rarely evolves on an annual time scale, and certainly not advanced technology like AI. Yet, here we are once again. Sure, 2019 was as fruitful as it gets in the AI research community. The raw debate between Neural Networks Extremists (those pushing for an “all neural nets all the time” approach to intelligence) and the Fanatical Symbolists (those advocating a more hybrid approach between knowledge bases, expert systems and neural nets) took an ugly “Mean Girl” turn, with two of the titans of the field (Gary Marcus and Yann LeCun) trading real insults on Twitter just a few days ago.  Continue reading The Human Interface: What We Expect From AI at CES 2020