Broadcom's Billionaire Chairman Names Seven Big Tech Trends Not to Miss at CES It’s the show where industry insiders converge to see the latest and greatest products and technologies in action. But for anyone who’s trying to get a leg-up on where the trends are headed, it’s worth looking beyond the flashy booths on the main floor of the Las Vegas Convention Center.
At Broadcom, we make semiconductor components that bring these products to life, creating new technologies to enable experiences that consumers will be eager to adopt in the future.
This year, we’ve got our eye on at least seven important trends that people will be talking about at CES. Here’s a sneak peek.
The Internet of Things Is Upon Us
The idea behind the Internet of Things is simple but powerful: the quality of life of every person on the planet can be vastly improved by connecting everyone and everything to the Internet. When sensors and communications technologies are embedded into many of the objects around us, magical things can happen.
This year, the magic is most obvious around wearable devices, from Internet-enabled smart watches to fitness trackers like the Fitbit or Nike Fuelband that can wirelessly upload data about your health or diet to a smartphone, or to the cloud to share with friends, or even to your doctor’s database.
The Internet of Things sets up the potential for a new wave of hardware entrepreneurs, akin to the recent wave of app developers in the software domain. Combine a standard low-cost development platform incorporating low-power processors and wireless connectivity with ongoing innovation in sensors and you have a recipe for a renaissance in hardware development. Because the barrier to entry is so low, even a small three-person start-up working out of a garage can get funding on Kickstarter and design a new hot product that’s limited only by the imagination.
The beauty of entrepreneurship is that there is no limit to the range of devices that people will create – some frivolous, some profound. Last year, there was considerable CES media buzz around a network-enabled fork designed to keep people on their diets. These innovative concepts have a common thread: They are transforming everyday objects into active network nodes that can "sense" the world around them and report back to the network via always-on low-power communications links.
There’s no doubt that the Internet of Things will be big – but we’re still in the very early days of its development. Expect to see rapid growth in the number of IoT devices in the coming years as we head toward an Internet with tens of billions of connected devices.
Wireless Charging: Like Magic
To date, one of the biggest limitations of wireless charging – the almost magical ability to charge mobile phones or other devices through magnetic induction – has been the lack of standardization. Currently, there are three competing standards – but the industry will hopefully converge to one in 2014, setting the stage for interoperability of wireless charging systems from multiple manufacturers. The trend should pick up speed in 2014 and start working its way into the mainstream in 2015, especially if some of the larger consumer electronics manufacturers adopt the technology for mainstream products.
When wireless charging does take off, it should accelerate the Internet of Things marketplace. Suddenly, it will be much easier to charge both wearable devices and smartphones at the same time – without having to physically plug numerous gadgets into the electrical outlet next to the nightstand.
Ultra HD TV:Coming To A Living Room Near You
The successor to high-definition television has arrived in the form of 4K TVs, also known as Ultra HD Smart-TV. These TVs, which still carry premium price tags in retail stores, have four times the pixel resolution of conventional 1080p HD displays. The CES demos of Ultra HD televisions are truly remarkable but, for now, there’s not much Ultra HD content available, aside from a small handful of downloadable videos. Still, sales are on the uptick and are expected to grow rapidly as prices continue to decline in 2014. One key to wider adoption will be the emergence of Ultra HD set-top boxes – which will stimulate the creation of more Ultra HD content. Once all of that happens, expect Ultra HD Smart-TV to be adopted in a serious way, with sales expected to hockey-stick in 2015 and beyond.
Connected Cars: Living Rooms On Wheels
The car remains a fascinating platform for connectivity – a living room on wheels. Expect to see improved multimedia options in 2014, especially for rear-seat entertainment systems, thanks in part to better connectivity by way of in-car Wi-Fi and LTE connections. With a Wi-Fi enabled car in the future, you will have the ability to update your music or video content while the car is parked in your garage, when it pulls into a gas station or anytime it can gain wireless Internet access. A persistent LTE connection in the car would enable these capabilities while on the go.
The Holy Grail for connected cars will be autonomous driving – but don’t expect to see self-driving cars on the market until at least the next decade. Autonomous driving would be a boon to the semiconductor industry, given the need for sophisticated sensors, cameras, radar imaging, high-accuracy GPS capability and other wireless connectivity technology to pull it off. In the meantime, we are already seeing some initial steps in that direction with features like automatic parallel parking and collision avoidance systems.
LTE: Now On Smartphones Everywhere
While CES isn’t really a mobile devices show, there will be some innovations on display. One example: the speeds of LTE devices are starting to increase. Today’s LTE networks and phones operate at download speeds of up to 75 megabits per second but soon the network operators will boost those speeds to 150 Mbps and eventually over the next several years, as LTE-Advanced is deployed, to 300, 450 and 600 Mbps. Do you need or want those speeds? Eventually you will, as video download usage continues to grow and as distribution of Ultra HD video content becomes more prevalent.
Proximity Awareness: The Next Great Marketing Opportunity
Increasingly, mobile devices have integrated GPS technology to identify exactly where they are at any given moment. For the most part, existing location technology has been an outdoor phenomenon, dependent on GPS satellites and used primarily for navigation. But new location technologies are being developed which leverage Bluetooth and Wi-Fi beacons that will pinpoint your location inside buildings, down to a meter or less. That opens up interesting possibilities for advertisers and marketers, with the potential to transform traditional bricks-and-mortar stores into Web-enabled nodes on the network. Imagine walking by your favorite store in the mall and getting an offer for a 20 percent discount that’s good for the next hour. For retailers and consumers, indoor location services will forever change the shopping and entertainment venue experience.
5G WiFi: More Bandwidth, More Range
Today, as consumers tap into legacy Wi-Fi networks to stream, upload and download from their multiple devices, such as smart TVs, tablets and smartphones and even some home appliances, the desire for more speed and range has become clear. To meet this need, Broadcom’s 5G WiFi technology is taking off in a big way. Speeds of a few hundred Mbps in a smartphone or nearly 1 Gigabit per second in a tablet or computer are now possible. Several leading smartphone manufacturers are currently shipping 5G WiFi in their high-end devices. Over the next few years, the speeds of Wi-Fi devices will continue to increase, but an even greater benefit of 5G WiFi is longer range, which will provide better coverage inside your home or office.
These trends are just a sampling of what’s in the works for 2014 and beyond. As the industry continues to move forward, expect to see more devices with faster connection speeds and expanded capabilities. It’s no longer a matter of if – it comes down to when. These technologies – and more – will be here sooner than many realize.