CES 2016: Press Day, Showstoppers and LaunchIt Event

Estimated reading time: 8 minutes

Tuesday, January 5, was press day at CES 2016. Some of the largest press conferences are held on press day. Many of them are basically one- or two-hour advertisements with a number of new product announcements inserted, and some do provide a great deal of market data and trends.

The bigger “pressers,” such as the Samsung event, fill multiple auditorium-sized rooms as well as overflow rooms that pipe in the event to overflow crowds via live video. On the other hand, some are held in much smaller venues to perhaps a few dozen members of the press who have a specific interest in the technology being discussed.

The Samsung event must have drawn over 1,000 attendees. In fact, there were long lines just to get into the overflow rooms showing the event on live video stream. Of all the press events, Samsung’s seemed to get the most attention and the largest attendance.

Following are some of the key new product announcements made by Samsung.

• A New Smart Hub: The new Smart Hub is designed to provide users with easy access to all of their favorite content—including live TV and games—in one place. There’s even a menu on the home screen of the Samsung Smart TV that allows users to access their favorite programs as soon as they turn on the connected TV.
• The Samsung Smart Control remote: The new Samsung Smart TV eliminates the need to have to deal with multiple remote controls. Their new Smart TV will automatically recognize the type of game console, set-top box, or home theater system that is connected to the TV. This allows users to control all of the external devices with the Smart Control remote, with no setup required.
• Console-less Gaming: Consumers can enjoy the most realistic gaming experience on a large-screen without the need for a console. More than 500 streaming and downloadable games will be available on the 2016 Samsung Smart TVs.
• Smart View: The Samsung Smart View mobile app allows users to share their favorite content. The upgraded Smart View is now available beyond Samsung Galaxy devices, supporting Android and iOS devices, as well as Window PCs. Popular apps and websites including AccuWeather, Crackle, iHeartRadio, M-GO, Plex, Pluto.TV, UFC, Vimeo, YuppTV and more are all now Smart View enabled.
• More access to content: Streaming UHD movies and TV shows from providers such as Amazon, M-GO, and Netflix and accessing apps such as YouTube is now even easier. You will now be able enable a selection of sporting events to stream. UHD Consumers can also connect Samsung’s new Ultra HD Blu-Ray player via HDMI (2.0a) for access to UHD movies with HDR. Also direct access to live programming from providers such as Dish and Time Warner Cable is simplified.

Samsung says that the new SUHD TVs will begin rolling out this March. 

That's a ShowStopper

This year, ShowStoppers partnered again with the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) to help entrepreneurs and startups pitch new products to the press and raise early seed capital. This was the fourth edition of ShowStoppers LaunchIt, the official CES pitch event for startups that exhibit in the Eureka Park TechZone during the show.

I consider Launchit to be a fun event like “Shark Tank,” which highlights some amazing ideas and some devices that make you wonder, “Why would anyone want that?” Launchit also shows that there are a number of very smart, inventive and hardworking young people ready to lead in the next generation with some amazingly good ideas and a lot of hard work.

Let me tell you about some of the better new products that were pitched at the Launchit event on Tuesday.

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