Nothing new. That was the conventional wisdom about CES 2012 in Las Vegas. Well, after spending two days last week at the show, I think the conventional wisdom is wrong. There are many new and cool electronic products at the show and they all point to exciting times for Spansion and our customers. Why?
Seeing as 7 is a lucky number and no, I didn’t hit the big 777 jackpot on a Vegas slot machine. I thought I would give my list of 7 top phrases of CES 2012:
1) Smart – Smart appliances were prominent in both the Samsung and LG booths. What is a smart appliance? Internet-connected refrigerators and washer/dryers can provide social networking, access to Internet content, and remote monitoring and access.
Now, you could use your smartphones to check your mom’s best recipe against the contents of your Smart wifi-enabled refrigerator and get a text message telling you you’re out of meat. In the future, almost all home appliances will connect to the Internet, so networking and security will become key word of 2012. Spansion Flash will be critical to maintaining privacy of this information.
Smart is not new for digital TVs and is becoming a standard feature of all new TVs for access to over-the-top programming as well as the occasional Google search or Skype session. The coolest new function in TVs was the addition of built-in microphones for voice-control to avoid complex remotes. Is this smarter? It certainly is better and leads to our second top phrase, voice recognition.
2) Voice Recognition – Speech-based controls have become the center of attention among consumer electronics and voice recognition is a key feature in many new products—HDTVs, tablets, smart phones, remote controls and cars. Many big manufacturers including Sony, Panasonic and TCL presented voice-controlled products at 2012 CES.
3) Google TV – Marvell Semiconductor presented a reference design for Google TV IP STB, based on its Armada 1500 chip. While Marvell touts it as a 2nd-generation Google TV, it appeared not significantly different from other smart TV interfaces, which integrate online services like YouTube and Netflix and live television. Marvel didn’t discuss any potential manufacturers of this 2nd-generation Google TV. However, the market is wide open since few large TV manufacturers have yet announced any Google TV solutions.
4) Tablets and Smartphones – Tablets and smartphones galore…and not only from the tablet manufacturers, but also new products from chipset suppliers such as Intel, Nvidia and Qualcomm. One new trend was different sizes. Some smartphones were being unveiled in larger formats; for example, the new Samsung Galaxy Note is a whopping 5.3” screen by phone standards. Meanwhile, some tablets were going the other way in smaller formats. Toshiba was showcasing a 5.1” tablet. Clearly, the lines will get more blurred over time.
5) Mirror-Less Cameras – Fujifilm announced their Mirror-Less X-Pro1 with APS-C 16M “X-Trans CMOS” sensor inside developed by Fujifilm. Fujiflim introduced more randomness in the color filter array to minimize both moiré and false colors, eliminating the need for an optical low-pass filter in the lens thereby unleashing full “unfiltered” lens performance. The system will ship in late February for around $2000, including body and a lens.
Canon has yet introduced a Mirror-Less camera, but they have ratcheted up the specs of their latest camera Canon PowerShot G1 X Digital Camera. It has new 14.3-megapixel CMOS sensor with wide dynamic range and shoots images at high speeds at full resolution (Up to 4.5 fps for 6 frames).
Reaction speed is becoming critical for these cameras and digital camera manufactures are evaluating using high performance NOR flash instead of NAND.
6) Android –“Android” was the word I heard most concerning the OS of these various tablets, smartphones and SmartTV. Several manufacturers including Motorola, Sony and Huawei demoed their products on Android 4.0.
For example, Motorola introduced its Droid RAZR MAAX and Droid 4 products running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. The RAZR MAAX has a 4.3-inch bright display with a 1.2 GHz TI OMAP4 processor, 3300mAh battery and fast 4G LTE. Droid 4 is the latest in Motorola’s smartphones. The new Droid has a 4-inch qHD display and an 8-megapixel rear camera that can record 1080p Full HD video.
Chinese hardware giant Huawei introduced the world’s slimmest phone, the Ascend P1 S. Its 4.3 inch touchscreen comes with Corning Gorilla Glass. Inside is a dual-core 1.5GHz TI OMAP 4460 Cortext-A9 processor running the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich making the phone, according to Huawei, the fastest and most compact smartphone in its segment. Huawei leads us to our last phrase.
7) Chinese Manufacturers – There were many Chinese electronics manufacturers with large booth presences at 2012 CES, presenting their newest SmartTV, smartphone and tablet products.
I had talked with an interesting Chinese camera module maker – Sunny Optical Technology. While they only had a tiny booth, the camera module they showed ships 10 Million units every month! CTO Mark Xu indicated that they would be opening a new office at San Jose next month to support worldwide tier 1 tablet and smartphone customers.
I cannot help but believe that is this trend that will accelerate. Spansion has an excellent presence in Asia Pacific, but our headquarter location in Silicon Valley is surely going to be an advantage to support these Chinese companies coming to US.
Nothing new. No way! We are seeing improvements and innovations in almost every area of the consumer electronics business. Higher performance, more sophisticated software, embedded connectivity, lower power consumption and increasing elegant user interfaces are all driving the new designs. Spansion’s family of Flash products are ready to make 2012 and beyond a great year for all consumers and manufacturers.