CES 2020 Innovation Awards: Winners and trends
Each year, CES runs an extensive programme of innovation awards, selecting a subset of the thousands of products on show on the basis of their engineering, aesthetics and design, uniqueness, the innovation they bring to the consumer market, and more.
There are two levels of recognition: 'Honorees' are products that score above the threshold for a given category, while 'Best of Innovation' is reserved for the highest-rated product(s) in each category (see the CES website for more details on the judging process and expert panel).
In 2020, 464 products received awards, 31 of them being Best of Innovation winners:
Company | Product | Category |
American Printing House for the Blind | Accessibility | |
Atmosic Technologies | Embedded Technologies | |
Avast | Cybersecurity & Personal Privacy | |
Bosch | In-Vehicle Entertainment & Safety / Vehicle Intelligence & Transportation | |
Bosch | In-Vehicle Entertainment & Safety / Vehicle Intelligence & Transportation | |
Bot3 Inc | Embedded Technologies | |
Charmcare Co Ltd | Wearable Technologies | |
Colgate Palmolive | Health & Wellness | |
Damon Motorcycles | Vehicle Intelligence & Transportation | |
Doosan Mobility Innovation | Drones & Unmanned Systems | |
Human Capable Inc | Computer Hardware & Components / Digital Imaging or Photography / Embedded Technologies / Fitness & Sports / Headphones & Personal Audio / Health & Wellness / Home Audio or Video Components & Accessories / Mobile Devices & Accessories / Smart Cities | |
Hydraloop Systems BV | Sustainability, Eco-Design & Smart Energy | |
iniVation | Embedded Technologies | |
Leica Geosystems | Digital Imaging or Photography | |
LG Electronics Inc | Video Displays | |
mmh Labs | Tech for a Better World | |
NextMind | Virtual & Augmented Reality / Wearable Technologies | |
nthing | Smart Cities | |
OnePlus | Mobile Devices & Accessories | |
OrCam Technologies | Accessibility | |
Outsight | In-Vehicle Entertainment & Safety / Smart Cities | |
Owl Labs | Computer Peripherals & Accessories / Robotics | |
Samsung Electronics America Inc | Home Audio or Video Components & Accessories | |
Samsung Electronics America Inc | Video Displays | |
Sleep Number | Health & Wellness / Smart Home / Tech for a Better World | |
Syntiant Corp | Embedded Technologies | |
TecPal Ltd | Home Appliances / Smart Home | |
Valerann | Smart Cities | |
VIRSIX GAMES | Gaming | |
Zyxel Communications Inc | Computer Peripherals & Accessories |
Two CES Best of Innovation award winners: Syntiant's NDP100 Neural Decision Processor and Colgate Palmolive's Plaqless Pro smart toothbrush.
As you'd expect, there's a wide range of innovation here — from a processor designed to run deep-learning algorithms to a smart toothbrush that detects biofilm buildup in the mouth (see above), and many points in between. A notable category is Tech for a Better World, which saw two very different winners: mmh Labs' Bluefin, a wearable tag for fish that measures water temperature, pressure, depth and pH levels; and Sleep Number, whose Climate360 Smart Bed creates a personalised and responsive microclimate with automatic firmness adjustability.
Companies with the most award-winning products in 2020 were all familiar names with large portfolios: Samsung (38), LG Electronics (17), ASUS (11), MSI Computer (8) and HP Inc (7).
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The leading product category for awards was Smart Home with 51, although this was down on the number for 2019 (61). Health & Wellness saw a big jump in award-winning products, from 16 in 2019 to 46 in 2020, to take second place. Perhaps surprisingly, the 2020 awards table was propped up by categories that have had a lot of coverage in recent years: Drones & Unmanned Systems and 3D Printing, both with just four award-winning products:
Some of these award-winners may go on to commercial and/or world-changing success. Others, as ZDNet's Tiernan Ray has documented, may fade after a brief spell in the spotlight.