The Global Stage For Innovation

CES 2019 brought together content creators, Hollywood, the advertising industry, media, and leading CMOs to explore the future prospects of brand marketing and entertainment.

Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2019 opened on January 8, 2019, unveiling the latest transformative technologies. Innovation across every major and emerging industry was demonstrated, including the latest in AI, 5G, entertainment, sports, and automotive. The event featured some 4500 exhibitors, including 1200+ startups, with the launch of more than 20,000 products. Owned and produced by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), CES 2019, ran through January 11, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The major themes around 5G, data transparency in the age of GDPR, TV innovation, and OTT measurement remained on top of mind for most. The keynote explored the 4th Industrial Revolution, as 5G is poised to open up a new world of opportunities for robotic manufacturing, AR/VR and mixed reality, sporting experiences, public safety, and more. Companies showcased their technologies and solutions in end-to-end content value protection, active content monetization, and smart business operations with a focus on cloud-based and as-a-service strategies for pay-TV service providers and content owners. All of the hardware developments were intriguing and set a compelling stage given the forthcoming bows of premium OTT platforms and forthcoming streaming services in the industry. Few manufacturers even proved that the entertainment experience does not have to be confined to traditional living room walls.

Broadcasting trends at CES 2019
4K goes to 8K. This year at CES, TVs started to make the jump from 4K to 8K. 2019 should finally be the year 4K live broadcasts become more widely available. A group of technology brands came together at CES 2019 to form a new industry organization: The 8K Association (8KA). Founding companies for the 8KA include panel supplier AU Optronics (AUO) along with consumer electronics giants Hisense, Panasonic, Samsung Electronics, and TCL Electronics.

OTT measurement and performance marketing. OTT measurement is all the rage, specifically de-duplicated reach and frequency. Marketers want to be able to attribute their impressions to business outcomes, further echoing the need for measurement across all screens, specifically with OTT taking more of the digital video advertising pie.

Everyone is working with Apple. Apple is opening up its iTunes movie and TV show store to various TV manufacturers; hence no Apple TV streaming box is required. That is a source of 4K and HDR content, now available, to TV owners.

The car as the next portal of entertainment. The automobile will be the next great TV platform, although it is going to take a while. At CES, automakers like Mercedes, Audi, and BMW showed autonomous concept cars that attempt to bring the comforts of the living room into the automobile. They are filled with screens waiting to be filled with entertainment, news, sports, and weather.

Enhanced audio return channel (eARC). Another impressive intelligence feature announced at CES 2019 has to do with how displays interact with other devices using eARC. It has the potential of changing the way manufacturers develop soundbars and amplifiers, using HMDI 2.1 to make them more plug and play while capitalizing on the latest Artificial Intelligence inside the displays to optimize the picture quality.

Live streaming innovations. The main trends of this year’s show included more integration of AI and Machine Learning (ML), cloud-based everything, and robots everywhere. Many of these trends were reflected in the vision of the future of live streaming. The Internet & Television Association (NCTA), CableLabs, and Cable Europe joined efforts with internet providers to bring 10G to consumers i.e., 10 gigabit per second speed using ethernet cable. Manufacturers promised to include wi-fi 6 compatibility in their new mobile devices this year. A new standard of image compression, JPEG XS, was introduced at CES.

In Conclusion
At the show the entire 5G ecosystem came together, highlighting that 5G will change everything. CES 2019 showed AI will influence every aspect of consumers’ lives. C Space brought together content creators, Hollywood, the advertising industry, media, and leading CMOs to explore the future of brand marketing and entertainment. Exhibits and conference sessions explored the effect of AI on marketing and consumer engagement, mobile, OTT video, and content consumption. The AR and VR technology has evolved and grown into a multi-million-dollar industry. CES 2019 set the world abuzz with the promise of technology from global brands and visionary startups.