CES - Las Vegas’ Premier Show
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The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is Las Vegas’ largest and premier convention. In fact, it’s the largest tech show on the planet! It’s been a long, long time since we attended a professional convention. With 3500+ vendors and an anticipated 180,000+ attendees from around the world, CES offers a daunting opportunity to see what’s new, what’s trending, and what to expect in 2023 and the future. Fortunately for us, we were able to attend the CES as media because of David’s electronics editor status at Good Old Boat and our continued blog posting and YouTube videos on JustALittleFurther.com (JALF).
Throughout our business careers, we attended countless medical shows and conventions usually as exhibitors, not conventioneers. But that was many moons ago and, wow, how the landscape changed. This was definitely larger than anything we’d ever experienced, and as you’d expect, everything is digital. We picked up our badges at the airport terminal baggage claim area by scanning our QR codes and voila, our badges complete with lanyards were printed and we were all ready to go. A CES app allowed us to choose seminars to attend, view exhibitor profiles and locations, set our own agenda, and even view shuttle schedules. At the convention itself, our badge QR codes were scanned for every entry, by every vendor in which we showed interest, for every seminar admittance, and even to get free COVID test kits. If we wanted a vendor’s press kit, we just scanned the booth QR code to access everything we needed. Magic! and pretty darned efficient.
The first two days of the show entitled CES Unveiled were designated as ‘Media Only’ and most events were held at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center. We found free parking for the day at the Westgate at the north end of the Strip and caught a free media shuttle to Mandalay at the south end.
We were alone on the shuttle and figured maybe there wouldn’t be that many people participating. After all, how many media folk could there be? As it turns out, hundreds and hundreds from around the globe… 4,700 media registrants to be more precise. Major news networks, radio stations, and print media… we sat at a table with a group from USA Today one day, a group of national radio disc jockeys/talk show hosts another day and new reporters from Japan, Colombia and Jamaica yet another. All the major networks including the local channels were present. Press credentials swung from lanyards of the major world press outlets. The media room was always buzzing and offered free laptops, workspace, interview booths, wifi, lots of seating, charging outlets and most importantly, free food and drink.
The media days were filled with seminars, presentations, press conferences, and sneak peeks at innovators and innovations. We attended the standing-room-only opening address which was excellent and provided an overview of technology trends and directions in 2023 and beyond… more robots, more autonomy, more enterprise, more AI… in every industry from transportation to manufacturing to gaming to healthcare to whatever field or market you can imagine.
Another presentation was conducted by Brunswick, a leader in the marine industry, which was introducing a new electric 7.5HP outboard and also gave us a glimpse of the future of obstacle-avoiding, self-docking boats. Oh, man, wouldn’t that have been an awesome product when we had Nine of Cups! Omron, known for their home blood pressure monitors, offered insights into their future healthcare products.
In true Las Vegas style, actor, Kal Penn, and three Olympians along with multiple big, bright screens and high-energy music provided Panasonic with an introduction to its newest technology. Not to be outdone, Canon introduced M. Night Shyamalan whose new thriller Knock at the Cabin will be released in February and utilized Canon’s technology in its cinematic production. A full-size replica of the cabin was erected in the convention hall a few days later. And Arnold Schwarzenegger joined BMW to help introduce a new AI car. Big productions and pretty heady stuff!
A sneak peek at a couple of hundred vendors capped off one day. We wandered from booth to booth, sipping wine, noshing hors d’oeuvres and oohing and aahing at an amazing diversity and breadth of products from e-motorcycles and folding e-bikes to OTC hearing aids, to electronic punching bags, to birdhouses that not only photograph birds that land but identify them, too. I’ll share a peek at some in my next blog and then we’ll move on to the Las Vegas Convention Center which just blew our minds!