CES 2016 – where are we heading?
Olena Kaplan, Beecham Research
In the first week of January, while many were still recovering from their Christmas break, the tech of tomorrow was at full blast in new inventions at Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Beecham Research’s Olena Kaplan and Matthew Duke-Woolley report.
With each year this show gets bigger and 2016 was no exception with the event being attended by 160,000 attendees, 3,800 exhibitors and covering almost 2.5 million square feet of exhibit space.
As we all head towards the fully connected world, there are number of areas that can be identified as dominant:
The smart home continues to attract both traditional players in home goods as well as increasing numbers of start-ups entering this rapidly-developing market. This year we have seen an increasing number of white goods makers entering the smart home market. Bearing in mind that behind them are well-established brands in the segment, such as Samsung and LG, these are the likely candidates to make their way to the market. This means that in one form or another we are about to see an increasing number of smart fridges, which will allow the consumer at a minimum to control what is inside without opening it.
The robot vacuum cleaner is not a new concept but, the version where the consumer can control where it does its job is definitely a useful addition. The kitchen continues to attract engineers’ attention as making it smarter at least promises less time spent in the kitchen with a better quality result. Some of the devices that were presented in addition to focusing on specific groups also offer new business models. For example, D-vine offers a machine which ensures for the wine lovers the perfect condition of wine for consumption. The idea behind it is similar to the coffee machine concept, where the customer orders wine tubes designed specifically for the machine which enables the machine to provide the perfect conditions for the wine in question.
A similar option is also available for beer lovers. PicoBrew, the automatic all-grain home brewing machine, offers craft beer brewing at press of a button. The consumer can purchase a Picopak, pre-packaged ingredient combinations available from brewers and breweries from around the world. All the user has to do is fill a keg with water, load the hop and grain modules with the pre-packaged products, and hit brew. Will it change how we consume wine and beer? Maybe for some, but how long will it take to do so?
In 2015 the question of security once again brought a number of concerns while at the same time being one of the major drivers for smart home uptake. The interest in safety was clearly high on the smart home agenda at CES 2016 with more and more devices featuring cameras ensuring control of the premises while user is away. Another focus of interest is the control of resources at home. In addition to a number of solutions that allow control of electricity consumption, like Ecoisme which received a CES 2016 innovation award, this year an interest in water control consumption was addressed by Hydrao and GreenIQ.
The auto industry was another big sector for CES. In 2015 the auto industry focused on developing new business models, implementing security in architecture, and the integration of aftermarket systems with – potentially – third party application development. Connected Car is a stepping stone towards fully autonomous driving and driverless cars are on the horizon. Fully autonomous vehicles require a secure connection to perform updates, read the digital road infrastructure, and communicate with other connected vehicles on the road. At CES 2016, the main story has been the safety statistics of driverless cars.
Leading up to CES, the press has reported that Google has now clocked over one million miles on the road without causing accident. Tesla gained some serious exposure when a consumer uploaded video of their auto pilot performing emergency braking and preventing a collision. Soon after that another Tesla owner modified the autopilot feature on his car to achieve full driverless operation.
The incentive to phase out a human driver in favour of automated systems is about saving lives and preventing accidents. On average there has been a fatality every 15 minutes on US roads in 2014-2015. By comparison there has not yet been an accident caused by an autonomous vehicle and there are multiple reports of driver assist features preventing accidents. The adoption of technologies such as driver assistance, lane detection, and automated emergency braking will really drive down the number of fatalities on the road.
Gary Smyth, director of GM’s Powertrain Research commented that fully autonomous vehicles are still some time away and manufacturers need to start to consider more detailed problems, such as when a car must navigate around a temporary obstruction or is redirected by law enforcement or follow diversions. GM plans to have cars capable of autonomous driving on highways in production by 2017.
2016 will be the year drones are likely to go from interesting novelty to useful gadget. The Unmanned Systems Marketplace in the South Hall covered more than 25,000 square feet, a 200% increase over the 2015 CES show, according to CTA. Exhibitors including DJI, Yuneec, Hobbico and Squadrone System demonstrated smart drones that track where you are to shoot better videos. Intel RealSense has designed an automated collision avoidance module in a consumer drone. Computer systems are getting much better at operating in the real world autonomously.
Follow-me tracking together with active obstacle avoidance were amongst the main focus of the demonstrated progress in CES with some manufacturers achieving this with sonar and others with infra-red. In addition, the introduction of incorporating a sensor for looking at the floor allows the drone to function – land and take-off – without GPS.
Drone racing is starting to really take off. These systems are much more comfortable to operate with a headset so the pilot can see the view from the on-board camera. Battery life for drones is still a big problem. The Parrot Disco is a consumer drone with one propeller and fixed wings which uses geo-fencing to remain in the vicinity of the user – no special training is required, and manages to stay in the air for almost twice the duration of a more traditional multi-prop drone – 45 minutes flight time versus 25 minutes on average). Earlier in the year Amazon revealed its new design for a delivery drone which incorporated fixed wings and gliding to allow far greater effective range.
Some products covered in CES are more likely than others to be part of our everyday lives already tomorrow. Others will take years to be finalised and might eventually absolutely change their appearance or the process of achieving their goal, or never make it. CES continues to be a great platform for brainstorming for engineers and investors alike, keeping the industry on its toes.