Anyone who read my earlier blog post this year knows that I am always happy to travel to Berlin. Especially when I get to spend three days wandering around IFA, Europe’s biggest technology fair, immersed in the latest gadgets and technologies. Beyond my personal enthusiasm, these events are valuable for our agency. Not only because clients such as AVM, playing on home ground, iRobot, Nextbase and sextech company MysteryVibe are showing what they can do, but also because we can discover the latest trends and new market entrants.
Expectations were high again this year, and rightly so. There was more to see than I could possibly describe. For a selection of highlights, read this article about the best gadgets or this one about the main trends. Something else caught my attention, however, and I would like to share it.
Home appliances and German TV chefs
A glance at the floor plan shows that roughly a fifth of the exhibition is dedicated to home appliances. Entire halls are filled with products such as Miele washing machines and vacuum cleaners and Bosch kitchen appliances. The sheer number of products offered by these and other manufacturers is extraordinary.
To promote their smart kitchen products, the major brands have brought well-known German TV chefs to IFA. Elaborate dishes are prepared at their stands in front of consumers, business contacts and, in some cases, television cameras. Major broadcasters such as ARD also report live from the fair. Popular German bands perform in the background while familiar television personalities interview major companies and trendwatchers. For an entire week, Germany revolves around technology.
German visitors
I had expected a floor full of stereotypical technology enthusiasts, so the visitor profile was a pleasant surprise. Ordinary German families made up a large share of the crowd. Smart homes were one of this year’s overarching themes. Smart devices communicate with one another, of course, but now they can also communicate with you through voice control.
Amazon Alexa and Microsoft’s Cortana are among the most common platforms on which other brands base their products. That includes the many start-ups that were given their own hall for the first time this year.
Facial recognition also made an impression. Smart robots analysed visitors’ faces to estimate characteristics such as gender, age and ethnicity. The next step envisioned at the fair was to combine this with voice control to assess a person’s mood and adjust music, lighting or the timing of a robot vacuum’s cleaning round accordingly. A less obvious example was Philips’ smart toothbrush, which uses sensors in the brush to help improve your brushing technique.
Back in the Netherlands
Unfortunately, the Netherlands does not have a technology industry on that scale, and our domestic market is much smaller. The excitement IFA generates in Germany is enviable: the subject our PR agency is passionate about is presented so professionally and attractively. Through everyday products such as washing machines, refrigerators and televisions, German consumers discover the latest technologies both at the fair and through national media.
Dutch media fortunately cover the event extensively and from many angles, bringing that information to Dutch consumers too. But the atmosphere of the fair is impossible to reproduce. In the Netherlands, Bright.nl helps drive interest in innovation through Brightdays and, more recently, Brightnights. These events offer a smaller version of what I saw at IFA: ordinary people immersing themselves in one of the fastest-growing sectors.
I would recommend visiting, both as a consumer and from a business perspective. Fairs such as IFA and events such as Brightday give PR professionals an opportunity to meet journalists in a setting that inspires both groups. A look at the competition is equally valuable. What are they working on? Which new players are entering the market? Which trends are emerging in your clients’ sectors? By visiting these events, PR professionals act as the eyes and ears of both their agency and their clients.
Tip: mark 26 October 2017 in your diary. CES, the world’s largest technology and innovation fair, is coming to Amsterdam for a preview of its Las Vegas event.
More news ›