Visions from the future at the CES in Las Vegas (which is not so far away)

After two years of the COVID-19 pandemic and an ongoing energy crisis, both large and small companies have aimed for a future based on environment and sustainability that could be understood by everyone.

The three days at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas were intense. We were present inside the Techmission Group, organised by Confindustria Varese, to personally see what the biggest technology exhibition would present after two years of pandemic and in the middle of the energy crisis. During these days, we mostly saw a future that is not so far away: few special effects, but a lot of awareness of a world that is changing and that the technology can help make it more liveable.

The companies we met or visited were really focused on the environmental sustainability, lower energy consumption, from cars to smart home living. Many companies, such as Panasonic, Sony and Samsung, didn’t fill the stands by showing televisions or smartphones. Or rather, these objects were there too, but they were the tools to manage many other situations aimed at the attention towards the environment. The stands were used to recreate situations that could lead consumers to understand how to improve their experience in relation to the energy savings. It was done with more or less short-term solutions. However, they are doable with proper programming and awareness.

The Metaverse was present, but with still basic applications, which were not easy for everyone to use and especially not for a long time. The world is evolving, but it will still take many years for it to be fully accessible to the public, as some experts claimed.

Artificial intelligence was also not presented as a revolution in some sector, there was no special effect that showed it at work. Nevertheless, it was present almost everywhere. As Alberto Mattiello pointed out at the CES opening, artificial intelligence will save the world. Therefore, it was horizontally present in a lot of products and situations. Motocars aside, we found ourselves facing situations that mainly presented a turnkey contract to manage the environmental sustainability of our own lifestyle, from home to leisure – even in the agricultural sector, which has never been so present at CES.

This does not mean that things were not done in style. Absolutely not. CES and Las Vegas have both an exaggerated aspect that leads them to be “too much”. However, this year was as if the technological world had been hit in the face, and then pulled itself together to propose a truly affordable and accessible future for everyone.

Translated by Frangella Sofia and Rizzi Vanessa

Revised by N. Dall’Osto