Living in Digital Times (LIDT) revealed the top lifestyle tech trends of 2018 in a press conference on CES Media Day 1. In addition to trends overviews in High-Tech Retail, Fitness Tech, Digital Health, Sleep Tech, Beauty Tech, Baby Tech, Kids & Family Tech, Digital Money and Wearables, four exciting companies (Philips, Neutrogena, Project Nursery and Interaxon) revealed their new products for the first time during the event.

Dedicated to contextualizing how technology fits into everyday life, Living in Digital Times produces nine conferences during CES and oversees more than 110,000 square feet of the lifestyle tech show floor featuring more than 300 exhibitors at the Sands Expo, Level 2, Halls B & C.

Robin Raskin, founder and president of Living in Digital Times, gave a big picture overview of the trends, which included:

  • IoT: A World of Machines in Conversation: As our homes become smarter and more connected, many brands are finding ways to integrate IoT into everything from home security systems to pet beds.
  • AI/Machine Learning = Access to Too Much Data; Winners Will Make Data Actionable: With more data than ever available at our fingertips, it’s critical to provide context around what consumers should do with the information. Many fitness and wearable brands are finding smart ways to take biometric data in through their devices and provide actionable and personalized plans for the wearer.
  • AR/VR: Revising Content for Immersive Experiences: Developers are working at warp speed to provide quality content for the AR and VR devices that are increasingly saturating the market. From VR programs that can help with pain management to smart makeup mirrors and dressing rooms that help you try before you buy, every industry will see a dose of these alternate realities soon.
  • Bye Bye Keyboard: Voice Control, Haptic Gestures & Brain Waves: Typing is so 2017. Looking forward, we’ll see everything from bank transactions to ordering groceries done using only a voice command, or even a thought!
  • The Digital Diet: Healthy Balance of Tech and Life: For a generation that loves tech, we do talk an awful lot about disconnecting from it, too. Innovations in sleep technology point to consumers’ desires to use tech to help them get offline and focus on health, while the kids tech industry looks for ways to balance kids’ inherent love of screens with their need to imagine and play in the real world.
  • The Digitization of Everything: With so much tech available, there’s no limit to where it can be a part of daily life. Families can now track every moment of pregnancy and infancy with an array of impressive baby tech devices. Meanwhile, traditional banks are finding smart ways to integrate fintech to make the process of managing money more palatable for the digital age.

“This year, you risk having the entire show floor start talking to you if you utter the name ‘Alexa’,” said Raskin. “We’re seeing deeper connections between these technologies and tech being utilized in industries that are historically tech-shy, like retail and banking. Our conferences during CES will help to put it all in context.”

Four exciting announcements were made by top brands during the press conference:

Philips announced SmartSleep, the world’s first and only clinically proven wearable solution for consumers to improve deep sleep quality for people who do not get enough sleep. SmartSleep is the latest addition to Philips’ growing portfolio of smart digital platforms and intelligent solutions that connect people, technology and data to give consumers data-driven insights into their health and access to professional expertise and advice.

Johnson & Johnson (Neutrogena) debuted sophisticated skin imaging technology that allows consumers to measure what’s happening above and below their skin’s surface. The Neutrogena Skin360™ app and the accompanying SkinScanner powered by FitSkin™ give users an in depth understanding of their skin’s condition and needs, customized advice to address those needs, plus a clear way to track and assess skin’s progress over time.

Project Nursery announced the Project Nursery Smart Baby Monitor System, the first-ever baby monitor to integrate Amazon’s Alexa Voice Service (AVS). This newest offering is designed to create a one-of-a-kind nursery system that allows parents to control the nursery ecosystem, track activities, and access information simply by asking.

Interaxon revealed their expansion into new markets in 2018, including EMEA, LatAm, and Australia, and its flagship Muse product will be available in French, German and Spanish as the first new languages in its expansion. Interaxon has also been developing a VR/AR application kit for its brain-sensing technology and will showcase an entirely new category of consumer technology, using advances in low-cost brain sensors for head-worn virtual and mixed-reality systems. Through software development toolkits and licensing, Interaxon is making its core technology and platform available to a broader partner base across all form factors, including the Muse headband, VR/AR and Lowdown Focus glasses.

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