Ereaders at CES
Just returned from my first CES in Las Vegas. The size of this show is mindboggling, as everyone in the consumers business tries to make an impression by showing their latest stuff. What were the most important topics in displays? Ereaders and 3D, without a doubt.
On the latter, there were many companies showing of their 3D displays. Interestingly, there seems to be a strong trend toward displays where people need to wear glasses, rather than autostereoscopic systems. I have to admit that I can’t imagine myself watching tv on the couch wearing these glasses all the time, but I guess that’s probably because I’m over 40 :-) Samsung, in a “stand” that was probably larger than our entire office, showed a.o. a 3D OLED tv. Toshiba showed a nice 3D system, where they had integrated gesture recognition to control the tv. No more fighting over the remote....
The special eReader section, organized by the IDPF, hosted more than 60 companies showing their latest stuff. What were the highlights in my perception? Firstly, there was the launch of the first “flexible” eReaders by Plastic Logic (plastic electronics) and Skiff (Si on Steel). Interestingly, there was not much talk about the backplane technology, but more about the large size of the display and the positioning of the product, both in terms of usage and pricing.
Secondly, there is a growing number of hybrid devices appearing. The Edge from Entourage with a double screen approach, a rather heavy device that looks more like a laptop than a reader, the Nook from Barnes & Noble and the Alex Spring Design. Would these exist if they had a display technology that can do video and color at low power?
The “traditional” 6” type eReader based on E-ink technology is now being sold by a host of parties. Starts to be difficult to see the differences, other than the slightly different look and/or color of the casing.
The demand for color and video is large, from the display manufacturers to publishers and the end product makers. All of these stopped by at our booth and were very impressed with what we showed. Clearly our electrowetting technology is filling a big hole in the eReader space. In addition, people also recognize the longer term opportunities of it.
The other technology that showed a good-looking prototype (behind closed doors) was Qualcomm with their Mirasol technology. The main differences here? Most likely scalability and cost, as the electrowetting strongly resembles the existing LCD process, while the Mirasol requires a dedicated facility.
Oh and finally, there was also a 150” PDP presented by Panasonic. Size does matter after all?
Johan Feenstra - CTO, Founder Liquavista