CES 2020
Generating a buzz
CES 2020 in Las Vegas was full of the weird, wonderful
and potentially life-changing from the world of
technology. Stuart Wood reports
utonomous vehicles,
Ivanka Trump and
sex toys took centre
stage at CES 2020 –
but not at the same time.
This year’s show saw a
strong presence given over to
carmakers, whose industry is
increasingly crossing over with
the tech world (see page 47).
It also featured controversy
around the appointment of the US
President’s daughter as a keynote
speaker, with some arguing it
was unwarranted and did little to
further the cause of diversity for
women in tech.
Nevertheless, there were
plenty of product highlights,
from potentially life-changing
innovations to one-off gimmicks.
Chinese company Nreal
showcased a pair of glasses which
impressed many, with their ability
to project AR images over real
life. Samsung-backed start-up
Neon also showed off its “artificial
humans”, which received mixed
reviews.
The interactive, virtual
characters are intended to act as a
kind digital friend, responding to
voice inputs. While it isn’t difficult
to imagine them
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Videocassette
Recorder (VCR),
1970
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Issue 1 2020
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Player, 1974
being used as assistants in event
reception areas, some said their
interactivity was limited and the
quality of animation left a lot to be
desired.
Among the ‘weird and
wonderful’ category we can
file FasTeesH, a company
which showcased a new kind
of toothbrush. The Y-Brush is
esssentially a mouthguard on a
stick, which purports to be able to
clean teeth in ten seconds. You bite
it for five seconds and turn it on,
cleaning half your mouth at a time
- a great time-saver for delegates
running late in the morning.
Another question mark is
Samsung’s kitchen assistant ‘Chef
Bot’ – a pair of white, robotic arms
that emerge from the top of a
kitchen counter, and can prepare
dishes for you. The arms can
measure amounts, cut ingredients,
and do the cooking itself with
the aid of vision algorithms and
artificial intelligence.
Whether or not these pieces of
tech could revolutionise our daily
lives, or be consigned to the
scrapheap, remains to
be seen.
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Camcorder
and Compact Disc
Player, 1981
Top: Ivanka Trump,
and CTA CEO Gary
Shapiro
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Technology,
1990
Above: TCL shows off its
new 8k TVs
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Interactive,
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Television,
1998
w w w.exhibitionworld.co.uk