Mexico. The market for technology products and services is one of the growth that has never been witnessed before in history. The adoption of these by Homo Telecom follows the dizzying pace of progress in these developments and is even observed at a point of new acceleration due to the effect of the Internet of Things (IoT).
That is why it is not surprising the charm of the first week of the year where manufacturers, laboratories, developers and many more meet, all except the "ordinary" consumers in what we could call the electronic consumer fair.
The term "market" refers to the geographical or virtual space in which supply and demand meet and interact, technological in the case of this meeting at the beginning of each year. However, this is actually a meeting of the agents on the supply side, the end consumers have no place, other than in the name of the event.
The Consumer Electronics Show (#CES) has been, since its first edition in 1967, the showcase of technological innovation for the world as a whole. Among the announcements that have been raised throughout its history are, among many others, the Nintendo video game console (1985), high-definition televisions (1998) and tablets (2010). To tell the truth, a large majority of the disruptive technological products and services that we know and use today, have been presented to the world at this fair.
These consumer electronics are not just goods that we use for a finite time, replace or discard. Rather, these are devices that have entirely transformed our paradigms of communication, connectivity and entertainment.
In the 2020 edition, held in Las Vegas from January 7 to 10, it was shown again the advances and future technological trends to be adopted by consumers in the short, medium and even long term. There were numerous products presented at the event, where the applications of 5G and the Internet of Things (IoT) in different areas such as entertainment, automotive innovations, gadgets for health, home, robotics and artificial intelligence, among many others, stood out.
It continues to anticipate the new configuration of markets that will take place and the process of adoption of the products or technologies that were presented at the event. Rather than focusing on the launch of disruptive products, this year's CES witnessed the evolution and maturation in technological innovation that, without a doubt, will transform consumption patterns as the adoption of these advances is massified to the bulk of consumers.
Technological Innovation in 2020
In 2019, the first steps of operational implementation of 5G technology took place.
CES 2020 continues to promote this revolution in wireless communication, now with the implementation and consolidation of products that integrate this technology. Along with 5G we expect rapport with other technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and IoT. This binomial coupled with the connectivity of 5G has opened new opportunities for companies and industries of transport, appliances, agriculture, robotics, wearables, among others.
With the arrival of 5G in networks and gradual incorporation into equipment, it is anticipated that the entire ecosystem of smart devices will be integrated into a single network, therefore, the homologation and integration between manufacturers is essential for the development of technology.
About everyday devices such as smartphones, tablets and laptops, the prospective standard of several manufacturers is increasingly composed of dual, foldable and flexible screens, among others. Although some of these announcements were conceptual prototypes, that is, they have not materialized and launched massively to the market, they are already beginning to generate expectations of functionality and application development to begin to enter the market and generate preference among consumers for these devices.
At CES again the cars were central stars of the event. On the one hand, consolidated automotive brands such as Mercedes-Benz and Ford, delved into the concept of electric and intelligent vehicles, while among the biggest surprises came from Sony, with the presentation of the electric car prototype. Although its production will not be immediate, it served as a showcase for the technologies it offers in terms of screens, cameras and sensors.
Autonomous cars and transportation systems continue to expand their presence in the tech ecosystem, complemented by the integration of amenities and luxuries into the car's interior.
As every year TV developers continue their trajectory of innovation, this year with an emphasis on 8K technology that will continue to expand both the audiovisual experience and its market. In addition, radical new designs abounded as usual such as the ultra-thin screens of LG's Gallery series where a 65-inch TV will have a thickness of 20 mm or the Samsung 8K TV where 99% of its front surface will be screen and an incredibly thin design with 15 mm thickness.
The cost of acquiring these innovations could exceed the budget constraint for the average consumer. Nonetheless, 4K technology is expected to intensify its adoption, while new technologies will remain luxury products for demand segments with high incomes and intensity of technological consumption.
Strong competition between AMD and Intel is looming in the processor market, with the arrival of AMD's third-generation Ryzen processors for laptops, being the first chips for AMD laptops. On the other hand, Intel will look to compete with its own graphics cards, after years and years of letting Nvidia and AMD decide the future of this key component of our computers. On the last day of CES 2020, the company gave us the first images of the Intel DG1, the company's first discrete graphics card in two decades.
A peculiar and disruptive theme was the presentation and open exhibition of sexual products with technology, which seems to be the beginning of a market with a great future, from the destigmatization of sexual technology by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) organizer of the event. It is worth remembering that, in its origins, this fair had dominantly a component of erotic-technological application, which today is back in some proportion.
Finally, a launch that could represent a radical change in the streaming and audiovisual content market was that of Quibi, a platform that will arrive soon with an offer of videos or fragments of videos of 10 minutes or less called "quibi". Its main differential and value offer compared to Youtube or Instagram TV is that the content will be generated by celebrities and Hollywood stars in such a way that the content is of quality.
The success or failure of the products and technologies presented at this event will depend on the ability to adopt in the established market. In the case of Quibi, it must try to direct its strategy to generate a network effect that generates a massive adoption of the service, for which it must rely on a platform that allows interaction between users and content creators.
For the companies that develop smartphones and tablets, it will be an important and decisive year for the future of folding screens and will be a game of strategies between these companies to achieve the product that generates trust and preference for this technology and consolidates a basis for the future development of it.
It will take several more years to have 8K screens in our homes, foldable phones in our hands and cars with artificial intelligence on our streets, the main barriers to adoption in the short term for the consumer continue to be the price of these products and the availability of alternatives and similar technologies at affordable prices.
However, it is necessary to know these technological advances, since they will begin to delineate consumer trends, market and future investment strategies that are decisive for the development and consolidation of current and new markets.
Text written by Ernesto Piedras of The Competitive Intelligence Unit.
