Top 10 CeBIT 2016 Highlights

7 min readMar 31, 2016

In our previous post, we began our CeBIT 2016 adventure by presenting some of the innovation that we have deemed interesting. We will continue telling our story by showcasing the Dashmote top 10 highlights from CeBIT 2016.

1.Pepper

In recent years, robotics have a tremendous leap in terms of mobility and functionality. Industrial robots have been the innovation engine for several industries such as the automotive, aeronautical and many others for decades now, but we are entering a new era where human-robot interaction is the focus. A Business Insider report has estimated that by 2019 there is going to be a $1.5 billion market for consumer and business robots. Pepper fits these segments entirely as one of the first robots which were created to be a day-to-day companion for humans and the first humanoid to be available for purchase by consumers. Pepper perceives principal human emotions by analysing facial expressions and tone of voice, and its mission is to increase our happiness. Powered by a unique IBM Watson developer kit, it can sense hidden meanings in communication and gradually memorise your personality traits to adapt itself. It has a large number of applications, and it is used already in 140 SoftBank stores to greet and inform customers.

2.NAO

Since we are living in the century of robotics, we could not overlook the smaller brother of Pepper, Nao, which is built and developed by the same company Aldebaran. Nao was the first robot the company launched back in 2007, and currently they released the fifth generation. More than 7000 units have been sold worldwide to research labs, hospitals, and schools. Nao is special due to the ease of customization and the large selection of applications which enable it to have different interaction modes. Powered by IBM Watson, Nao managed to beat us every time at rock paper scissors. It forecast with incredible precision our next choice every time and the motion sensor did not miss a move. The two robots are the closest we have been to real life Science Fiction; they are some of the first humanoid robots powered by artificial intelligence.

3. The HPE Avatar platform

Born out of a joint venture project between HPE, Quantum Matrix and Physan, the 3d scanning booth creates a full 3d digital reproduction of a person in a matter of minutes. The booth developed by Quantum Matrix takes 64 different pictures of the subject and by stitching them together and apply a digital mesh it creates a high quality animated model. The model is clothed by Physan, which indexes and scans designer clothes fitting them perfectly on digital models. The level of detail can go up to the material’s surface such as cotton, wool, silk and others. The possibilities are endless from the fitness industry to the retail stores.

4. Mind controlled BB-8 Droid

Following the box office hit ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ the robotics company Sphero created the very popular kids and not-so-kids remote controlled toy the BB-8 Droid. Joshua Carr, an IBM engineer, combined the popular toy with the power of the Emotiv Insight commercial headset which reads and reacts to your brainwaves. The result is worthy of Science Fiction literature a mind controlled BB-8 Droid. Some say the Force powers it, but actually, the framework of this experiment is the IBM Node-Red a tool which makes it possible to connect IoT devices and APIs in a simple interface.

5. Magic Box

Hid away in one of the corners of the venue we have found one of the most interesting pieces of technology. The company CSSwas showcasing the “Magic Box”, a revolutionary display box that uses a transparent touch-enabled display to showcase a manuscript. The device is a beautiful combination of physical and digital interaction. Several cultural institutions around the world such as the “National Library of Vietnam” and “University of Belgrad” are already employing the technology.

6. A VR broom flight

Although it sounds very weird in Hall 11 which hosted the amazing Scale 11 startups, you could take a flight on a magic broomstick. No it’s not a secret military experiment and you could not physically fly over the heads of the other exhibitors on a real broom, but rather you could take a Virtual Reality ride. The company LocomotionVR, specialises in providing extraordinary VR experiences just from a software perspective but also the physical dynamics involved in the process. Although their first application seemed like something that Harry Potter fans would die for, the implications of this technology go far beyond just the experience. Together with the significant product launches of Oculus and PS VR, it signals that virtual reality will become more and more widely adopted and thus reshaping the way we will consume content.

7. Drones, Drones and more drones

Drones have been one of the hottest subjects, of CeBIT 2016. The number of companies showcasing innovative designs and breakthroughs would be too big to cover in just one post but we’d like to mention at least a few.

One of the most interesting drones is the Onagofly. A full feature micro-drone the size of your palm which bridges the gap between amateur drones and professional drones. Within the small body, the company engineers managed to fit a camera , GPS tracking and add collision avoidance plus auto tracking of subjects. The company recently started to ship units after their very successful Indiegogo campaign which helped them raise $ 3.2 million.

Not long ago drones could be piloted only by professionals with training but due to recent breakthroughs in sensor technology, it has never been easier for regular consumer to pilot them. Terabee a company which is a spin-off of the CERN Hadron Collider has unveiled a new sensor which makes drone collision avoidance much cheaper. The sensor measures the distance to a focal point 1000 times per second, making it extremely accurate and enabling more drones on the market to have collision avoidance built in.

8. The new age of 3d printing

The 3D printing industry is moving at accelerated pace, the advent of cheap 3d printers and printing hubs lead to an increasing degree of acceptance. Many industries have been reshaped in the past years by this new printing technique and at CeBIT 2016 3d printing has been a star of the expo. From fashion shows to mapping landscape, we have seen so many applications of 3D printing, but the incredible precision of printed avatars stood out the most. The details of the figurines showcase the incredible precision of the new printing systems.

9. IoT, transportation and 5G

Traditionally at CeBIT, the German communications and software giants battle it out in terms of innovative solutions and certainly who brings out the biggest show. This year history repeated itself, DeutscheTelekom has had one of the most impressive stands at the expo. The main theme for the communication giant has been IoT and enabling digitalization through communication. The 5G end-to-end network cable of data transfers of 1.5Gbps will enable IoT devices to communicate with each other seamlessly. Imagine that your car is no longer a stand-alone object on the road and it actively communicates and shapes the environment around it.

10. No more need for wired communication

Part of the Telekom showcase we get a real example of 5G end-to-end in action. A robotic arm which is fully controlled through a wireless network, the extreme capabilities of the new standard allow for such a complex interaction with a highly precise tool. Factories would be completely interconnected in a full logistic chain and information shared by these devices will have no latency. By 2020 Telekom estimates there will be 20 billion of such devices connected to each other.