February 13, 2007

• Media servers, full HD televisions and high-resolution DVDs for the living room
• Mobile phones as luxury mobile office, entertainment platform and high-speed web terminal
• BITKOM predicts sales of almost EUR 150 bn for 2007

Simplicity and convenience will be the bywords when the latest offerings from consumer electronics manufacturers hit the stands at CeBIT 2007 from 15 to 21 March this year. Instead of the familiar jumble of appliances jostling for space in our living rooms – bulky CRT televisions, DVD players, hi-fi separates and an armful of remote controls – the new digital age comes neatly packaged in a sleek home server, which stores all our DVDs, TV recordings, photo albums and the complete CD collection on its hard drive. At the touch of a button the stored images and sounds can be transmitted wirelessly to the output device of our choice – be it the home cinema with flatscreen TV in the lounge, or the Internet Tablet in our bedroom. Even high-definition programming will soon be available for wireless transmission. The WirelessHD Consortium, whose members include Matsushita (Panasonic), NEC, Samsung and other big-name companies, plans to adopt the appropriate standard this spring.

They're bigger, they're cheaper, and picture quality is sharper than ever – at this year's CeBIT in March visitors can view all the latest trend-setting models from manufacturers of HDTV. “HD ready” (1280 x 720 pixels) is already yesterday's technology. In 2007 most manufacturers, at least at the top end of the market, are going with “full HD” resolution (1920 x 1080 pixels). At the same time TV manufacturers are vying with each other to offer bigger and bigger screens, despite price falls in the double-digit percentage range. Sharp is currently wooing customers with the world's largest television – a 108 inch plasma screen – while other manufacturers, such as Toshiba, are working on promising new screen technologies. Even the cinema-quality widescreen experience in our own living rooms is no longer a dream. Nearly every manufacturer of video beamers is bringing out new projector models in time for CeBIT, capable of screening high-resolution DVD movies in crystal-clear HD quality.

DVD players: the contest between Blu-ray and HD-DVD enters the next round

Only high-resolution DVDs let the new generation of TVs show what they are really capable of – especially since broadcast HDTV programming is still in short supply. Meanwhile the battle continues unabated between rival contenders for the future of DVD technology. While the Blu-ray Disc Association announced a few days ago that over a million Blu-ray players have been sold in the USA since the introduction of the new disc format in June 2006, the rival HD-DVD camp is fighting back with the issue of blockbuster titles such as the Matrix Trilogy and the Harry Potter series. At the same time Microsoft is stimulating demand for HD-DVD drives through sales of its Xbox 360 games console. The President of Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices Division, Robbie Bach, is confident about the outcome: “HD-DVD is going to be the best-selling format this year.” But there will also be some interesting new Blu-ray players on display at CeBIT. “The key to future-proofing the technology is storage capacity. HD-DVDs are limited to a maximum of three layers, with a capacity of 15 GB each. The Blu-ray-Disc, on the other hand, offers up to 200 GB”, points out Michael Langbehn, head of Trade Marketing & PR at Panasonic Germany.

Mobile phones: delivering communications, information and sophisticated entertainment

This year should finally see the nationwide roll-out of TV programming to mobile phones. In Hannover visitors will be able to view the brand-new second generation of handsets: mobile phones for DVB-H and DMB, as well as dual-mode phones that can handle both standards. But even without TV receivers the 2007 generation of mobile phones can be online anywhere, anytime, thanks to mobile broadband technology or WLAN, ready to download news, information or videos from the Internet in a matter of seconds. And with the advent of high-speed UMTS (HSDPA) it is now possible to achieve DSL data transmission speeds, hitherto available only on fixed lines.

Navigation is sure to be another hot topic at this year's CeBIT, now that more and more telephones can be turned into personal navigation devices with the right software. Mobile satellite links are also opening up entirely new possibilities and applications. It is now possible, for example, to take a photograph with a camera phone, upload it together with the GPS coordinates of the place where it was taken, and send it to friends, who will then be guided straight to the sight that you want them to see. What's more, in 2007 popular Internet community sites such as myspace.com are going mobile – and coming to a mobile phone screen near you. The latest phone cards offer up to eight gigabytes of memory – enough for music, photos or even films.

CE industry remains optimistic about the future – rise in VAT not expected to dampen demand