California start-up Varram showcased a Pet Fitness robot, which plays with cats and dogs at home via smartphone instructions, even dropping treats as a reward, while the owner is at work. Sensors in the robot help it detect and stay away from furniture to not get stuck, avoiding bored pets.
The robot can be timed to play with the family pet at different times and keep track of how much activity the animal has had. As executive director Jens Heithecker told AFP, "three main trends at IFA this year are 5G, voice control and AI (artificial intelligence)" with the latter two combined in innovations for the home.
The Home Connect system links household appliances, suggests recipes and even knows which ingredients are already at home, via cameras in the fridge. Once the meal has been prepared, the oven door opens on voice command, leaving the cook with both hands to slide in the dish. Meanwhile, the system's washing machine has built-in sensors to measure the moisture in washed clothes, sending the information to the drier.
However, some of these items do not come cheap. Panasonic's high-tech earphones are retailing for 1,200 euros ($1,326) while Samsung's massive 219-inch television, aptly called 'The Wall', is retailing to business customers for around 500,000 euros. Huawei created a buzz Friday by launching a new super-fast Kirin 990 processor, which has a version specially designed for the 5G era - the fifth generation of cellular network technology.