While CES has historically been the scene of the sexiest new technology announcements, this 2023 edition is far from the strong emotions Tech fans are accustomed to.
An observation that has been made for several years and which raises the question of the importance of such shows, both for brands and for consumers or observers. Why are Tech fairs no longer interesting in 2023? We have studied the question.
Covid effect
To deny the effect of Covid on the impact of international stock markets would be a mistake at best, a mistake at worst. After a year 2020 marked by cancellations, the industry also had to adapt to periods of confinement in all countries of the world.
Communication strategies have therefore changed, with video conferencing and online presentations taking precedence first, followed by local events. We then realized that the coverage by the media and influencers was not suffering, on the contrary. Better organized, more spread out in time, these presentations made it possible to cover the news in a more complete way without haste.
The Covid will also have made it possible to raise awareness of the ecological emergency, as the slowdown in travel has done our planet the most good. From that moment on, an ecological conscience began to spread more among newsrooms, agencies, etc. Why travel 2,000, 5,000 or 20,000 kilometers to discover products that can be treated by traveling a few tens or hundreds of kilometers?
So it was inevitable that the return “to the world before” was synonymous with the return of the major international fairs, so getting there seemed less obvious. And why go there when most major announcements happen outside of the shows?
Ads all year round
And if the manufacturers themselves had killed the salons? There was no need to wait for the Covid to accelerate the phenomenon. While Apple was the only one to host an “in-house” keynote for the past two decades, its rivals gradually moved away from living rooms to hold their own conferences.
And as long as they get things right, they started positioning their events around major trade shows just to kill two birds with one stone (monopolize journalists and prevent them from attending competing brands’ conferences). Samsung initiated the movement, followed very quickly by its competitors LG, Sony and Huawei.
Gradually, the dates shifted away from the periods of international fairs, according to an internally determined schedule. At Samsung, we present new products in February, then in August for smartphones. The TVs? Yet another date. And since every major player in the industry has its own program, the announcements are distributed throughout the year, leaving international exchanges uninterested.
Tech spins
And innovation in all this? Aren’t trade shows, especially the CES, created to showcase innovative technologies, concepts, prototypes, devices that make people say “wow”? It was true a few years ago. It is no longer in 2023.
Just look at the 2023 edition of CES to understand that Tech is spinning. The Las Vegas show, which in the past could have been compared to a Disneyland for high-tech fans, is now just a shadow of itself.
This year, the real stars of the show were the cars, so much so that CES has been dubbed the new auto show by some observers. The only innovative TV concept was as useless as it was technically interesting (we’re talking wireless TV Repress). As for the rest of the big announcements, most of them were already made at IFA or during exclusive presentations.
There were then some innovations left directly from start-ups that no longer knew what to invent. From the connected dog collar to the car that changes color (why?) to the chopping board with screen or the Withings urine sensor, there are countless gadgets that are as strange as they are useless.
A month after the MWC and if we already know that most manufacturers will not be presenting anything (or very little) innovative, what can we expect from the largest mobile show in the world? More new foldable smartphones? Yes… It will take more to create new momentum around an industry that is slipping away. Like his shows, which are ultimately only interesting for professionals.
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