SMART TECHNOLOGY TAKES OVER: THE STATE OF AI COMING INTO 2024

The future is now. That age-old tech promise feels truer than ever heading into CES 2024, as artificial intelligence and machine learning developments that once seemed out of reach become more embedded into consumer products. From autonomous transportation to personal robots with personality, CES 2024 looks to showcase AI and ML as ubiquitous parts of our daily lives.

A major AI theme expected at CES 2024 will be self-driving vehicles edging closer to mainstream availability. Most major car manufacturers and mobility-focused tech firms plan to unveil concept autonomous cars and related platforms. While questions around regulation and safety protocols remain unanswered, the raw software power of AI driver systems looks impressive as ever. Attendees could expect driverless car test drives on closed tracks exhibiting computer vision and decision making abilities matching average human drivers.

Voice-based virtual assistants and recommendation systems powered by natural language processing and generative AI also promise to infiltrate more smart home devices and wearables. From mirrors that critique outfits to refrigerators that suggest recipes based on contents, the interplay between humans and conversational AI looks more seamless than ever before.

On the machine learning front, processors optimized for ML workflows could finally help bring aspects of metaverse environments into average consumer laptops and mobile devices. Software built on ML for high-fidelity simulated physics, real-time environmental rendering, and multiplayer networking should enable more immersive and vivid VR, AR and mixed reality experiences without expensive specialized hardware. Attendees may get hands-on demos rivaling early metaverse hype cycles.

Further, ML advancements underpinning prosthetics and accessibility tools should be prominently featured. From artificial skin with biofeedback sensors, to glasses that convert text to audio for visually impaired users in real-time, CES 2024 promises to bring ML powered assistive devices closer to consumer reality.

As Moore’s Law sustains its last gasps, incremental chip speeds matter less; AI and ML software advances theoretically enable consumer devices to keep pace by optimizing how computing power gets utilized. CES 2024 should validate that claim, with the AI assistant, autonomous vehicle, metaverse, and accessibility tools of tomorrow demonstrating clears leaps over predecessors and bridging the gap from fiction to store shelf. After recent tumultuous years, the promise of AI and ML delivering real change hopefully energizes the legendary tech trade show.