CES 2007
By John Latta, WAVE
0702 1/26/07
Las Vegas, NV
January 8-11
, 2006
There is over 1m sq. ft. of show floor space, 140,000 came
from 130 countries. CES is Comdex and CE in one. We keep wondering is
it too large to be manageable? Yet, the quality of the exhibits remains
high. This is the 40th year of CES and continues to be on a roll.
Cisco Keynote
The WAVE having been to many John Chambers presentations,
this was a classic. Smooth delivery, engaged audience, finely tuned message
points, strategic and peppered with demos to illustrate concepts rather
than products.
Key points included:
Cisco is to build the Human Network.
The key to future business is
the ability to predict market
transitions, develop of vision of how to respond to
these,
formulate a strategy and execute. Cisco believes that
it has
done well here with its predictions of market transitions
in
1997, 2000 and 2006.
The transition to the human network
is founded on the
transition from analog to digital but more important
the
creation of new experiences. An example of this is
to post a
movie on YouTube. There are an infinite number of
ways in
which individuals can post content, the business model
is
around the use experience and the technology is totally
open.
The characteristics of the home
network include:
Safe
Open
Simple
Virtualized
Converged – data,
voice, video and mobility
The network has evolved in terms
of the ways in can be used:
Connection – eCommerce
Communications – VoIP
call
Collaboration – Wikipedia
Participation – YouTube
We should no longer be concerned
about a single device but
any device, any content. Thus the challenge is to
eliminate
boundaries, silos and complexity.
A key tenant is the people subscribe
to people and not to
services. Your content follows you everywhere.
Cisco’s participation in
the Oakland A’s new ball park is a
major testing ground for connecting users. The completion
of
Cisco Field is 3 – 4 years away but it will
connect the fans
like not see before, including on their cell phones
while
watching the game. Digital signage will also play
a role in
the stadium. Cisco intends that this be a major activity
and
it is called out in its road map.
Cisco TelePresence has transformed
remote interaction over
video, in a business setting. A consumer version is
4 –
5 years away. An illustration of both were shown in
the
presentation.
All networks will transform to
quad play – data, voice,
video and mobility.
It was predicted that by 2010
only 20 homes will create the
same Internet traffic that the entire Internet in
1995.
The connected experience requires
simplicity. Cisco’s major
challenge is to accomplish this – complex technology
but
simple user experience. Devices install and register
themselves.
The network is the platform.
When Cisco has participated in
new markets it has been
successful. Examples where Cisco has captured market
share
in new markets include:
Wireless – 65%
Security – 38%
Networked Home – 51%
Storage Area Networks – 24%
Digital Video – 68%
Cisco has shipped 81m consumer
devices to date. It has
formed a new media solutions group internal to Cisco.
It
claims no technology religion – standards based,
device
neutral, content agnostic and customer focused.
The first time that displays have
outsold the PC since 1996
was this year.
The Cisco roadmap includes:
Media
Photography
Personal Content
Communcations
Home Networking
Broadband Access
Home Monitoring
iPTV
Music
Storage
There were 2 demo sessions and
these showed a level of
integration consistent with the strategy not seen
before. A
migration of content and user preference from the
car, to
the PC, to the living room to the phone.
In order to succeed in this strategy
Cisco will collaborate
with others and acquire companies. There are at least
3
additional acquisitions in process in this market
space.
Cisco has shown how acquisitions can be made successful.
The following was provided at the news conference.
Cisco will be going to one consumer
brand – Cisco.
With the network as the platform
and the delivery of the
user experience is device agnostic, we will be much
less
dependent on devices.
The opportunity space is more
like a Greenfield that an
existing market.
Cisco will develop a set of APIs
and make these available to
its partners to accomplish these experiences.
We believe that Cisco can accomplish
this with its
traditional CE gross margins – 20% and thus
it expects to
have Cisco positioned as a premium brand.
Innovations from the Show Floor
Logitech – Moves
New Navigation Technology into the Mainstream
When The WAVE first spotted NuLOOQ navigator and NuLOOQ
tooldial at PMA 2006 we were impressed. Then at CeBit we asked Guerrino
De Luca where this product fit. His response included:
We believe this is a seed to
a much larger market. An
example where a new paradigm of navigation/productivity
is
required is Google Earth. It is hard to follow
a river for
example. With this type of tool it is possible
to implement
new forms of navigation that we believe will
be required by
consumers.
That is exactly what was shown at CES. 3Dconnexion has
announced the Space Navigator for $59. This will support CAD and GIS
professionals but it has consumer navigation application. Then a demo
was shown with Google Earth. The Space Navigator ID is not the same
as NuLOOQ but it still can be operated with a few fingers. The navigation
includes X & Y but also zoom. The demo began in the San Francisco
Bay Area, then a fly down the Grand Canyon and navigation over Paris
and around the Eiffel Tower, including a 3D model. It was stated that
the mouse and Space Navigator worked well together. The mouse can be
used for pointing and menu selection while the Space Navigator does
just this. Right now Logitech is testing the market and focusing on
web sales.
Alcera
Claimed
to be the smallest Internet radio device this
has Ethernet connectivity
and WiFi. It only weights 75
grams. Storage media
is SD MMC and HDD. It will capture
MP3 streams and playback
MP3 and Real Audio.
Ambient Devices
Ambient
Devices was showing a weather predicting
umbrella. At the base
of the umbrella is a handle which
picks up the weather
from the Internet. The base then
glows if the weather
will require the use of the
umbrella today.
The Dream Machine
Shown
was a suspended motion chair. Sitting in the
chair an individual
would drive a vehicle and feel the
motion. It attracted
crowds. Company in Australia.
Elksen
Elksen
addressed the UMPC keyboard problem with a
solution which combined
a carrying case with a
keyboard. The keyboard
was on top of the carrying case
and easy to use.
Emtrace Technologies
This
Korean company is showing a desktop hardware
device that looks like
a alarm clock – WidgetStation.
Its front is a LCD display
to show various widgets.
These can be downloaded
from the Internet or Emtrace.
The unit runs Linux
on an ARM9 processor, has a remote,
and can be connected
via Ethernet or WiFi. The display
is a dual 2.5” LCD.
Jawbone
Jawbone
is a hear held earphone and microphone. It
claims significant performance
advantages. This is
accomplished by individual
speech identification,
Speech is “felt.” Noise
removal and audio enhancement.
MoGo Mouse
This
is an optical Bluetooth mouse the size of a credit
card. It can be stored
in the ExpressCard/54 slot and
charges automatically.
There is a slight elevator
bracket which unfolds
from the bottom of the card which
puts the mouse on a
slight incline. The mouse is then
moved just like an ordinary
mouse. Innovative. $79.99.
Pcalchemy
Pcalchemy
has multiple versions of the Windows MCE in
small form factor boxes.
The Mini MCE can be held in
ones hand. It includes
a DVR, DVD, MP3 and computer in
one package that only
needs a display. There are
optional storage modules
for 250GB and 750GB. They also
have a TV tuner on a
USB adapter which allows for on-
air recording of content.
Swann Communications
A
complete line of home security products was being
shown. One of the more
innovative is the ability to do
motion detection in
real time and send an e-mail when
detected – called
CaptureCam. The video can then be fed
to a cell phone. They
also have a Digital Private Eye
hidden still camera
and recorder.
T.S. MicroTech
Shown
in the booth was in incar camera for $99, a
complete security systems
with 4 cameras for $499 and a
2MP IP canera for $199.
WildCharge
This
company got a tremendous amount of publicity. It
has a flat surface,
like a thin metal fabric, which can
lie on any surface called
the WildCharger Pad. This
plugs into the wall.
A device to be charged is plugged
into an adapter and
set on the pad. The device, be it a
cell phone, digital
camera, or laptop is then charge
with no direct electrical
contact. Multiple devices can
be charged at a time.
Impressive.
Ojo
The
original video phone sells for $395 and will work
on a standard phone
line. It also has a cordless phone
with it. New model was
shown in the booth and it is due
in Q3 for $250. Practically
no ID – it looks like a
brick sandwich. It has
no conventional phone as part of
the product. Claims
30f/s and the image quality seems
to reflect this. QCIF
phone. Both phones come with a
$9.95/mo service fee.
Home Server Products
Seagate
In
2005 Seagate purchased Mirra. The product is a
personal server. It
allows individuals to share data on
all network computers
and access the data from any
location. Web access
to the Mirra server is provided
free. Each computer
has a client which runs
continuously and notifies
Mirra of any changes in files
and enables incremental
backup. Mirra
has the following attributes:
Mirra
runs Linux but is fully secure. It is not
possible
to get internally to Mirra from the
outside.
Mirra never opens a file.
Seagate
offers the MirraGuard guarantee. If a file
is
lost with Mirra Seagate guarantees to recover
it
and if Mirra fails Seagate will do forensic
recovery.
Mirra
sharing is transparent to users. One can
publish
a folder and it automatically appears on
every
desktop with sharing privileges.
There
is no user set up.
Mirra
works equally as well with Windows and
MacIntosh.
The
most popular unit has 500GB in storage and
sells
for $599.
File
backup on the client is continuous.
Mirra
is headless.
Mirra
does not use AD and provides sync on the
LAN.
The
product has been sold for 2 years.
Mirra
supports the mobile office with its web
based
remote access.
Sales
to homes have been limited to ones that are
already data centric
and sophisticated, but this is a
small part of the overall
sales.
Iomega
They
have two backup servers: StorCenter Pro ($999) and
StoCenter ($799). Each
uses Dantz Retrospect Backup
software. Also included
is CA Brightsor ARCServe and CA
eTrust Antivirus.
WAVE Comments
Where are the new product categories? It was very
difficult to find something new. The floor was myopic on refinements
or tailgating successful products, such as in accessories. Possibly the
only two which we would call new are the umbrella from Ambient Devices
and the charger from WildCharge. This is certainly a disappointment given
all the words about innovation which flow from this event and the industry
as a whole.
The last 3 CES events were big on displays and it was even
more so in 2007. As John Chambers said, 2007 is the first year since
1996 that more displays were sold than PCs. As The WAVE has seen at other
events, the market growth in flat panel displays and televisions is driving
the CE industry. In the Samsung, LG and Sharp boots the product displays
were skewed to displays. It also begs the question – is there life
after television? With the end of analog television in the US in February
2009 the industry is looking forward to 3 or more glowing years and the
show floor reflected this.
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