Tomorrow, electric mobility for all
Compared to previous editions, the number of car manufacturers present was very limited. Only General Motors had come to make big announcements. The American manufacturer will invest more than 27 billion dollars in the electric vehicles of its brands, as with the famous Hummer. GM has announced the deployment of a fleet of electric delivery vehicles in partnership with Fedex. This is the BrightDrop project which also offers an autonomous vehicle for storage warehouses.
Whether it is GM, Panasonic, Bosch or Magna with LG, the race for eco-responsible batteries and not dependent on rare materials is on. More and more efficient batteries which, in a single charge, allow at least around 800 km. Sono Motors goes even further with its vehicle, the paint of which is replaced by photovoltaic cells which provide a range of 35 km in addition to the 250 km of its battery. At Hyperion Motors, they are banking on hydrogen, which would make it possible to drive over 1,000 km without having to recharge the vehicle.
Regarding autonomous cars, the British Transport Minister, Rachel McLean, announced that these vehicles could run and be marketed in the United Kingdom from 2025. But for the company Mobileye the democratization of autonomous cars among the general public and authorities regulators will only be done by taxi services.
Beyond consumer cars, autonomous vehicles are investing in agriculture, construction sites and even delivery. Cruise, a startup partly owned by GM, will test delivery via autonomous vehicles in Arizona in partnership with Walmart. Caterpillar has launched an autonomous mining truck increasing the productivity of mine sites.
Again, autonomous mobility also happens in the air. This year no Uber, Bell or Hyundai (see our debrief of CES 2020) but an autonomous flying taxi concept presented by General Motors.
The Tech World in the Age of COVID-19
Obviously the global pandemic was present in all the conferences during this CES 2021. Technological players and startups have increased the number of announcements and product launches in order to fight against the virus. Samsung, LG, UbTech presented autonomous robots to disinfect rooms in a house or office using UV lamps.
Razer, LG, MaskFone, Xrapid Group or even AirPop Active + have all launched a connected mask. They all compete in ingenuity with features to breathe better with ventilators or with the help of an oxygen cartridge, sensors that alert when to change filters, or even amplifiers of the user’s voice or even in incorporating headphones. The connected mask was clearly the trending product at CES 2021.
The fight against the virus also involves the use of biotrackers such as BioButton from the company BioIntelliSense. It works like a patch to stick on the skin. It monitors vital signs and identifies the first symptoms of the disease.
Other solutions present at the show: portable air filtration systems, door handles with integrated disinfection, doorbells with temperature measurement, refrigerators with a UV disinfectant system or even the portable lamp to clean your Motrex car.
The digitization of healthcare is accelerating
The digitization of health has been evident since the arrival of Covid-19. The penetration rate of telemedicine rose in the United States from 11% in 2019 to 76% in 2020. This digitization of medicine has greatly benefited startups like Teladoc, now valued at more than $ 1 billion.
On the CES, there is a multiplication of connected objects targeting health, such as the Oura Ring connected ring, the Sunrise patch to analyze the quality of sleep or even At-Patch for postoperative cardiac monitoring at home. Philips meanwhile offers a remote dental consultation service thanks to the data captured by its Sonicare Prestige toothbrush. Even the rehabilitation of the lower or upper limbs can be carried out at home and without a physiotherapist with H Robotics.
The prize goes to the Korean delegation who proposed the ideal connected health path. With Nuvilab you scan foods or dishes and we inform you if they are compatible with your pathologies. Algocare, for its part, creates food supplements on demand directly in your kitchen and according to your medical profile. A state of health which will first be monitored and analyzed by IconAI. This solution measures vital data such as blood pressure or oxygen saturation.
A digitized world for better and for worse
For Dr Amnon Shashua, CEO of Mobileye, artificial intelligence will soon take the reading comprehension tests. An AI (Artificial Intelligence) can then read the registration file for a new vaccine with health authorities and compare it with the history of vaccines given to humans. Depending on the vaccine methods used and the patient’s state of health, the AI will say whether or not it is appropriate to have them vaccinated. This should be possible in less than 5 years according to Dr Amnon Shashua. But according to him, the major problem around artificial intelligences is the notion of alignment, that is, the synchronization of artificial intelligence with human values, principles and ethics.
