Oh my, CES 2025 has taken me on one heck of a ride through the tech universe. I am an enterprise IT guy but, I must admit, the non-IT tech at CES had me fully distracted. Automated lawnmowers, high tech indoor garden planters, and my favorite- an ultra-realistic flight simulator. Wowzers- really neat stuff!
I somehow mustered the fortitude to fight through the distractions of the consumer tech and found a few enterprise-relevant takeaways from the show. I have some observations around connectivity that I will share in a more detailed posting but, for now, I have just a few high-level thoughts to share on somewhat unrelated announcements:
Flo.LIVE had a nice booth showcasing their cellular connectivity solutions. The company has made significant strides in expanding its local packet gateway presence, establishing a robust foundation for its growing IoT business. Its multi-IMSI solution is particularly noteworthy, offering seamless global connectivity—a challenging feat given the complex worldwide roaming and data privacy regulations. Enterprise IT and connectivity professionals can certainly appreciate the innovative work that Flo.LIVE is doing in this space.
Of course the big guys were on full display. AMD announced their new Ryzen AI Max series of processors that it hopes will penetrate the enterprise space, and Lenovo unveiled its new Thinkpad and ThinkBook mobile devices. The ThinkBook rollable screen is a really cool piece of tech. The screen defaults to 14 inches when first opened and expands to 16.7 at the touch of a button. The older I get the more I appreciate a large laptop screen. This one just might be on my Christmas list this year!
And then there’s Nvidia, who did not disappoint. During a very impressive Keynote by Jensen Huang, the company announced huge price reductions for existing products, while also introducing the GeForce RTX 50 series GPU’s, and a personal AI supercomputer that will be made available for a rumored $3,000. Nvidia should change their slogan to “AI for all” because that is certainly what they are enabling.
My feet are tired, my back hurts, and my brain is at capacity. But that is okay, and I’m glad I went to the show. It is a spectacle to behold. CES isn’t considered an enterprise technology show but that shouldn’t stop the enterprise folks from attending. The art of the possible is on full display and, with a bit of imagination, one can see how these concepts can be applied to enterprise use cases.
If nothing else, you just might find that next great gift idea.
