CES 2008: Understanding Industry Trends

That's not all

After we step out of the true industry leader ring, there's still more to see. It's pretty clear now how the big guys are guiding the industry, but are the little guys following?

Of course they are.

While we were moving through our meetings and wandering the floor in between, a couple other companies that I've covered this year point strongly toward portability (the theme of 2007) and interoperability. As I mentioned, we're looking at two-year roadmaps - many of these companies are refining the portability aspect whilst beginning to work on interoperability between devices.

For instance, let's take a look at RiData, the division of RiTech that I mentioned. RiData focuses on storage - more specifically, it focuses on SSD storage. SSD isn't just about the speed, despite the company's rather obscene Crysis level loadtimes - it's about reduced battery consumption and shock absorption. Namely, SSD is about travel - be it a laptop, an iPod, or any other portable device that could get bumped, bruised or used for longer than five minutes.

RiData's primary focus for SSD has been to bring up the performance while dropping power consumption through the floor - and in that, the company is quite pleased at its success. The controllers that it has developed for its drives do a great job of increasing drive life and speed as well, without having to "pay at the pump" with energy usage. Now, it's learning to pack on the size, too, squeezing a whopping 128GB into 2.5".


On the interoperability line (and perhaps as a focus for next year's products?), we're beginning to finally see a turn in battery technology, cramming more power into smaller space than ever before thanks to Lithium Polymer technology improvements. Leading the way is a UK company known as PowerTraveller, whose product lines focus on having a single green source of power for every device in your pocket or backpack. They even charge via solar energy, allowing you to completely unshackle yourself from the mains.

Wrapping it up

I hope you've enjoyed our coverage of CES this year, both in the daily updates from the floor and this look ahead. Each year, it's great to see what the industry has in store for us over the next few months - but it's even more exciting to see what the focus of all the world of electronics is for the next couple of years.

Above all, it's important to remember what this show is really saying - you, as the consumer, are the boss. Business is business - so if you want a product that is environmentally sound (like the PowerMonkey), of an open standard (like D.A.V.E.), or recognising consumer rights (like Sony's recent push to drop DRM and allow movie reformatting); you are the one who can make that happen.

Vote with your wallet - the companies are listening. And maybe in two years' time, we'll be covering a show that highlights the things most important to you.

Before I go, I did want to add a quick note of thanks to Henry and Jamie at Matrix Orbital for their support and assistance at the show, as well as a thanks to Angel, the Product Engineer at Seagate who spent far too long humouring my questions about the D.A.V.E. project.

And finally, thank you for reading!