Rebecca Day

"You shouldn’t read too much into display technologies,” Eisuke Tsuyuzaki, chief technology officer of Panasonic, told Consumer Electronics Daily at CES Wednesday. Instead of being technology or engineering-centric, the discussion of display technology should be about “what are the applications that make sense,” he said. The market requires a balance of quality and affordability, Tsuyuzaki said.

LAS VEGAS -- The Digital Entertainment Group announced an UltraViolet “starter pack,” a cross-promotional effort backed by DEG, retailers and CE manufacturers that will launch later this year. Calling it the “first digital cross-promotional effort of its kind,” DEG said consumers who buy an eligible connected TV or Blu-ray player will score free UltraViolet-enabled titles from Lionsgate, Paramount Home Media Distribution, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, Universal Studios Home Entertainment or Warner Bros., DEG said. It wasn’t clear whether consumers could secure titles from a mix of studios or had to choose all of the free titles from the same studio.

The specialty audio industry is struggling with an identity crisis, grappling with how to categorize a new genre of music systems that enable streaming yet still offer the sound quality that came to define high-fidelity audio. At the Polk Audio CES suite at the Venetian Tuesday, Al Baron, Polk’s product line manager, told us his company’s new wireless Woodbourne system “doesn’t have a category yet.” The half-moon shaped system delivers 180 watts of power to two 5-1/4-inch midrange drivers and a pair of dome tweeters, and is the first of a series of products under the Heritage sub-brand that will be true to the company’s high-quality audio roots but fit different form factors and use models, Baron said. “Half a dozen” products will be available in the Heritage line by year-end, he said. “We're not sure what to call the category,” Baron said, saying the company “batted around” terms like “wireless entertainment system” and “tabletop audio.” Ultimately, Baron would like to see a market research company hit on a name, he said. “The audio industry isn’t good at getting together to decide things,” he said. The $599 Woodbourne -- with Bluetooth, AirPlay and an iOS-compatible USB port -- will ship in Q2, he said.

Navvo, led by former Best Buy executive Wade Fenn, launched the Voco voice-controlled wireless multi-zone media system at CES. The $399 all-in-one media system streams music and 1080p video over Wi-Fi to V-Zone music receivers ($299 each) and V-Zone+ music and video receivers ($399 each), due to ship later this month from the company website, said Matthew Juaire, director-marketing and sales. The system is due in February, he said, and the company is looking for high-end distribution through CEDIA-level dealers and specialty AV dealers at CES. Navvo demonstrated its Android-based solution at CEDIA Expo but quickly discovered it needed to be Apple-compatible for the specialty market and has brought its iPhone app to CES, Juaire said. An iPad version is in the works, he said. Voco apps allow users to search for and stream music from Android and Apple smart devices, computers, and online services, Juaire said, but they don’t enable voice control for commands such as channel changes or volume “because people don’t want to repeat volume up, volume up, volume up,” he told us. Instead the voice control is designed to simplify the search process when sorting through large volumes of music and videos, he said. He compared the speed of saying the title of an album, artist or track with plugging in a title using a remote control on a smart TV or set-top box to search for an artist’s name, which he called “10-year-old technology.” He wouldn’t say which voice recognition technology the company uses. Each Voco device has an integrated music server that allows music streaming directly from iPods, MP3 players and USB drives, according to literature, and Juaire said the company was showing streaming video from a smartphone off-site in Las Vegas. Voco is targeting a market occupied in various iterations by Sonos, Logitech, B&W, Roku, Sony, Bose and NuVo. Voice control, and having both audio and video streaming, set Voco apart, Juaire said. The right distribution is also important, he said, noting that Sonos “has struggled” with its distribution through mass-market retailer Target. Voco wants to sell through dealers that offer “handholding” to customers, he said.

LAS VEGAS -- Amid a mobile computing market in serious need of a recharge, Intel said Monday at its CES news conference that Ultrabooks based on its fourth-generation Core processors will hit the market from $799-$899 when they ship later this year. Calling the next generation of Intel Core-backed computers “the notebook reinvented,” Kirk Skaugen, vice president and general manager of Intel’s Mobile and Communications group, said the fourth-gen processors are set to deliver the “biggest increase in battery efficiency generation-on-generation in company history.” He described “all-day battery life where you absolutely don’t have to bring your power brick at all."

The automotive industry is moving toward car-to-car communication “step by step,” Bosch executives said at the company’s press conference Monday prior to the start of CES. Luxury and mid-level vehicles today are “partly automated,” they noted, with assisted parking and adaptive cruise control features. Looking ahead, technology will help drivers avoid collisions with “evasive steering” and cars will be able to change lanes in response to cues. The connected vehicle will be a big part of how the industry gets to highly automated driving, which is a decade down the road, executives said. Issues that need to be resolved before car-to-car interaction becomes reality include development of common communication protocols, standardization of hardware, a secure means for transferring data to and from the cloud and a critical mass of equipped vehicles on the road, they said.

Onkyo, a latecomer to the U.S headphone market, in fielding its first four models at CES, the company said Monday. Onkyo follows audio rivals Denon, which overhauled its headphone line mid-year, Panasonic, Polk Audio, Klipsch, PSB, Monster and Sony, among others, and faces competition from newer, edgy brands Skullcandy, SOL Republic and Beats by Dr. Dre. Despite the late arrival to the headphone category, “it’s still a viable and growing market,” Paul Wasek, Onkyo’s national marketing and product planning manager, told us. “We're taking what we do with receivers and moving it over to more personal and portable products,” Wasek said, saying there will likely be additional categories “with growth potential” on the company roadmap. First to hit stores will be two closed-back on-ear headphones: the ES-HF300 ($179), with an audiophile-grade cable and gold-plated connectors, and the folding ES-FC300 ($149), packaged with a tangle-free cable, the company said. In-ear models include the IE-HF300 ($129) and IE-FC300 ($99). Headphones will ship during Q1, the company said. On how Onkyo will differentiate headphones in such a crowded market, Wasek said, “So many things are already being done that it’s hard to pick something someone else is not doing,” saying the company is “looking at a lot of different categories to expand our reach in the audio and CE markets.” The push-to-talk market is one possible area, he said. In addition, a headphone equalizer app for smartphones and tablets is in the works that will allow users to adjust frequency response for personal preference. Onkyo is looking at its existing retail base as well as “non-traditional” retailers for distribution, Wasek said.

LAS VEGAS -- Despite rumors last fall that Panasonic was exiting the plasma TV business, the company came to CES fielding 16 new plasma models ranging in size from 42-65 inches, said Vic Carlson, vice president-marketing, at Panasonic’s CES news conference Monday. But the company is also launching 16 new LED-lit LCD TVs, from 32-65 inches, following a lineup ratio consistently skewed in favor of plasma in previous years, a company spokesman said. The LED models are 15 percent more efficient than previous models and meet consumption requirements of Energy Star 6.0, Carlson said. An Ultra HD model could be announced “later,” a spokesman told us. Panasonic Corp. President Kazuhiro Tsuga is scheduled to give the opening CES keynote Tuesday morning before the show opens.

Lowe’s expanded its Iris product lineup to include routers and switchers to give homeowners a one-box solution for a connected home, the company said at CES Unveiled Sunday evening. It is also branching out into senior care as part of an effort to add “breadth” to its product and service offerings, Mick Koster, operations director of Lowe’s Smart Home Business unit, told us. Verizon Wireless will also offer a wireless USB-based router to enable customers to connect wirelessly over the Verizon Wireless network to monitor the home when away, a spokeswoman told us. Lowe’s launched its do-it-yourself Iris solution last July with three starter kits on its website and then expanded to 500 stores with plans to be in all 1,740 stores with the service by the end of this year, she said. The first three kits covered security, safety, energy and convenience and were based on Lowe’s $99 hub that can work with ZigBee, Z-Wave, or powerline networks. For 2013, the company is focusing on senior care services, she said. Sensors in the home can notify family members if an elderly parent’s routine has changed, she said. The company is following the trend of older seniors “wanting to stay longer in their homes, so we knew senior care is an area our customers are looking for us to go,” Koster said. Beyond senior care, Koster said Lowe’s is “going after breadth” with its connected cloud-based platform that offers a unified user interface for homeowners. Categories will get “deeper” as consumers want additional features, he said. Lowe’s offers 40 levels of installation across its various product lines and is looking at developing an installation service around Iris, Koster said. Iris is a “simple, do-it-yourself system,” he said, “but we know there are consumers who are intimidated by that, especially as you move into senior care.” The solution is currently “self-monitored,” Koster said, and emails for changes in activity or certain conditions can be sent to other family members notifying them of a change of status. At CES, Lowe’s is launching a button-based device seniors can wear and press if they need help. Lowe’s doesn’t currently offer an outside monitoring service so the message goes to designated recipients rather than emergency personnel. That could change down the road depending on what customers ask for, Koster said. The core service from Lowe’s -- monitoring for the account holder with access to the last three notifications from the service -- is free, and premium service is $9.99. The latter allows up to six people to be notified when an alarm or alert is triggered and provides access to the entire history of notification, according to the Lowe’s website. The senior monitoring feature is an additional $4.99 per month, Koster said. No contract is required for Iris service so consumers can opt in or out from month to month, he said.

Amazon’s Deal of the Day Wednesday, featuring a discount on select HD movies purchased and downloaded from Amazon Instant Video service, revealed how complicated and confusing the concept of cloud-based ownership is for consumers. Amazon’s deal, to own 22 HD movies from Amazon Instant Video for under $5 each, or $4 for the standard-def version, included The Wizard of Oz, The Dark Knight, The Goonies, Phantom of the Opera, Sherlock Holmes, Gone With the Wind, Willie Wonka & The Chocolate Factory, The Blind Side, The Shining, 300, Batman Begins, The Shawshank Redemption, The Matrix, Happy Feat, Casablanca, Singin’ in the Rain, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, The Departed, The Town, The Hangover, 2001: A Space Odyssey and Amadeus Director’s Cut.