Last week, techies, marketers, business leaders, and brands gathered at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas to view and discuss the latest consumer technology. Â As media professionals, the Consumer Electronics Show, or CES, is one of the highlights of our year; it gives us a glimpse of what brands are doing to better themselves, how theyâre marketing it, and what new technology may be available to us, either now or in the near future. Taking a look at which brands joined the CES conversation and what was presented, we found the top five trends from this yearâs trade show.
Tech Belongs in Travel
With business travelers and millennials demanding a more tech-savvy travel experience, those in the industry are looking to answer their needs in the splashiest way possible.
Hotels on the Las Vegas strip, appropriately where CES was hosted, are constantly working to bring a cohesive interactive experience to their guests. From mobile check-in and in-room tablets at the Aria to LED hi-def displays at The Cosmopolitan, the hotels are incorporating technology in every aspect of their offerings.
Taking note from the Disney Park MagicBand experience, and direction from Carnival chief experience and innovation officer John Padgett, who led development of the MagicBands, Carnival Corp. cruises will be incorporating wearable technology on its ships. At CES, the brand unveiled a coin-sized chip, named the Ocean Medallion, for guests to wear to get into their rooms, navigate the ship, order food, find friends and family onboard, and more. It even allows crew to customize guest experiences from the information embedded in the chip.
Brands at CES proved that tech in travel is all about making consumersâ experiences hassle-free, more seamless, and customizable.
Robots in Your Home
If CES proved one thing, itâs that our lives are becoming more and more like The Jetsons every day. Â Multiple brands showed up to the showroom with miniature robots that fit right in your home, teaching your children to read, playing music, greeting guests, and acting as personal assistants.
One of our favorite robots from CES was Mayfield Roboticsâ Kuri. The 20-inch adorable Kuri, a âlittle loyal home robot with a cheerful personality,â can follow you around, capture videos and photos, tell bedtime stories to your children, and welcome guests. It also learns and understands your household; it knows which room belongs to whom and can wake you in time for work and even greet you when you return. Kuriâs creators also worked with Pixar in creating a comprehensive (and endearing) robotic language.
Upgrade Your Wheels
There is currently stiff competition to perfect autonomous driving for the general consumer that multiple brands are participating in, but in the meantime, there are other impressive technologies that may soon be available in your car.
At CES, BMW displayed the BMW i Inside Future concept to display its new technology: HoloActive Touch. The HoloActive Touch ditches the traditional dashboard and instead features a massive floating display that stretches across. If you want to interact with it, just wave your arm. Buttons are so 2016.
Toyota was also present with the Concept-i, featuring a super-impressive AI system, named Yui. Not only will Yui be able to operate every function of the car by asking (which includes a seat massage), âheâ can also measure your emotions in order to build a relationship with you. Yui can tell if youâre stressed from rush hour traffic or enjoying your drive through the mountains by reading facial expressions. Tying into the autonomous driving tech, Yui notices if youâre not focused on the road or if your driving isnât up to the current climatic conditions and may take over. Yui also provides fun trivia for your road trips, which is definitely a highlight for us.
Everything is Getting Smarter
We just reviewed how our homes and cars are getting smarter with intense AI technology and robotic assistants that follow us around, but CES 2017 Â also showed that our less-expensive everyday items are, too. L'Oreal, Kerastase, and Withings teamed up to create the first Bluetooth-connected smart hairbrush Kerastase Hair Coach Powered by Withings. The brush, connected to an app on your smartphone, evaluates the health of your hair and measures the impact of different hair care routines. It features a microphone, 3-axis load cells, an accelerometer, gyroscope, and conductivity sensors.
If hair care isnât your thing and your morning routine is centered on coffee and food, Griffin Technology has you covered. With the Connected Coffee Maker and Connected Toaster, your daily cup of coffee and morning toast can also be Bluetooth-enabled and have a companion smartphone app that saves your preferences for every time.
Image Source: Griffin Technology
The Anti-Tech
In a bold twist, and a way to garner attention, a few brands decided to stand up against technology at CES 2017. Â
Actor Nick Offerman promised to unveil a âdevice like no otherâ that âoffers more meaningful ways to connect than ever thought possible.â The device? A good, old-fashioned paper greeting card by American Greetings that you can send via snail mail! Along with this joke-reveal, American Greetings gave attendees the chance to customize limited edition greeting cards with American Greetings illustrators and writers. In a statement, American Greetings executive director of marketing Alex Ho said, ââŚconsumers are now seeking ways to connect more meaningfully and differently with the people that matter most, which is why our category remains stable alongside the rise of smartphones, messaging apps and social media. American Greetings is at CES to celebrate that coexistence with digital technology.â
Tinder, which unlike American Greetings is actually a digital technology, also pranked consumers. The company made it seem that is was joining the virtual reality trend, as many tech companies are, and launching a new VR experience. Tinder had a booth and video featuring the product. When consumers peeked inside the multi-person headset though, instead of being brought to a different world or experience, they were looking directly into each otherâs eyes. Tinder wanted to remind people the goal of the company is to get people to match and meet up in the real world, and nothing can replace those interactions.
