News for the Hospitality Executive |
CES
2011
2011 is the Year of
Connectivity |
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By David Atkins
- January
2011
Highlights of CES 2011 - Jan 6-8, 2011 Las Vegas Everything is connected:
Put it all together and for our industry it means more consumer access to our sales and marketing messages in more ways, this also means more complexity for our FF&E discussions when building and remodeling our various brick and mortar assets. Making any capital investments at the property level, brand standards, etc will all change again. This time expect that all televisions will be connected. LG also was demonstrating connected devices for the kitchen and laundry, how long until we "need" these devices too. The 4G wireless hubs may have a big cost savings for our industry, or could be yet another threat to revenue streams. This hub was showed streaming three HD video streams at once with no loss of signal or degradation in quality. Are any revenue streams from Wi-Fi secure? Beyond wireless 4g hubs, the conventional air cards were prevalent as well. However, a 4G wireless hub of the type viewed could also be a huge cost savings for properties with hard to access traditional wired line access. The tablet wars are here, Apple, of course, has the market-share and dominant first mover, however everyone was showing a new/different version of this. Who will win and what does it mean? Simply put, you must have a mobile and tablet strategy. Intel’s Sandy Bridge line of chips is finally here and looks like a real game changer in speed and adding significant graphic and security at the chip level. Again all new capital investments at the PC and chip level where Intel is in play should now include this line of chips. The speed is between 200 percent to 800 percent faster than what you likely have today, which will impact every part of your business. Add in the additional graphics and security and I believe that Sandy Bridge is the real deal. Beyond this true video on demand from content creators through to end consumer now appears to be a reality. What does this mean for cable and other video providers? What does it mean for hotels and brands? Consumers are once again gaining options and control. David Atkins is a speaker, columnist, blogger, digital strategist, founding shareholder for Expedia Inc., chairman of HSMAI 2010-2012 and a regular columnist for Hospitality Upgrade. For related technology articles from Hospitality Upgrade please see:
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Contact: Geneva Rinehart Managing Editor Hospitality Upgrade Magazine and the Hospitality Upgrade.com website www.hospitalityupgrade.com/ [email protected] |