CES 2018 : tech, payment card… and the planet

Last part of the presentation of CES 2018 main trends, which will take place from january 9th to january 12th in Las Vegas, by Luc Bretones, vice president of the Technocentre and Orange Fab at Orange. After the empathic and sensitive domestic robots, the virtual and increased realities, the personalization of objects and the democratization of technologies and uses, zoom in on a daily and major environmental concern: the state of our batteries, and the future payment cards.

I anticipate a need for the CES of Las Vegas to settle a little more on the domains hitherto prerogatives of the MWC of Barcelona.

Whether at CES or elsewhere, at work, on holidays, on weekends, much of the conversation using our smartphones affects its energy levels. Our teens have become addicted to Wi-Fi, and thus Wi-Fi has become a basic need for physical survival just like food and of which a layer of it has been added in the famous Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

Unfortunately, the CES2018 cannot solve this problem once and for all, but it gives us temporary solutions, up to the achievement of sustainable energy storage.

While many are waiting for the end of the era of Lithium battery technology to be ushered in by more durable and sustainable organic solutions, such as developed by the Armor Group, I think that the optimization achieved by Enevate is particularly interesting. In fact, this company has earned recognition for its development at the CES2018 show because they have introduced Lithium-ion batteries with 50% more capacity and charges 8 times faster.

In the field of business model innovation, Lancey presents the first intelligent electric radiator with integrated battery for gas-powered electric heaters based on AI. The customer buys a powerful electric radiator at market price and Enedis rents the associated battery for operation.

Final connection between cloud and reality

DynamicSinc decided to expand the capabilities of the famous credit card before its likely final integration into the dominant handheld terminal and the all too likely porting of its superpowers in the cloud. Thus, the integration of function keys makes the credit card almost as smart as a smartphone – only the sound is missing. A concept that comes very close to the solution of OneWave, the card that unites them all: “OneWave allows you to leave all your cards at home to keep only one”.

In the spirit of a determined move towards the Cloud, one of my favourites is definitely Shadow Blade! Virtualized in the network, always up-to-date and accessible subscription-based PC. Access is either via a box at home where you can connect the keyboard, the mouse, the screen, joysticks, RJ45 and other components via software in the PC. If you also want to make it portable now, just use the app for your smartphone and tablet. Thanks to the cloud everything is networked together and the handling is enormously simplified …

The dream is near: a raspberry pi, a screen, a good internet connection and let’s go! I tested an online game on the shadow box by starting with a TV in the living room TV and then alternating seamlessly into the game on a PC and ending the game on a tablet the same way – with perfect transmission.

A pivotal year for CES?

After all these aspects, and much more, I expect a high level of innovation at the upcoming CES and a considerable acceleration in all the above areas. I also feel it is necessary for the event to increasingly focus on aspects of the MWC. Perhaps it may be a pivotal year for the CES, especially if it fails to pinpoint the new technological paradigm that is facing us.

To see and experience the previously mentioned stuff, and much more, do not miss to go to Las Vegas from January 9th to 12th!

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