The Consumer Technology Association (CTA)-- the US trade association organizing CES in Las Vegas— held a tech event in Amsterdam bringing together top media, exhibitors and investors to celebrate European innovation and to experience a sneak peek of the trends expected at CES 2019. Owned and produced by CTA, CES 2019 will run from January 8th -11th in Las Vegas with 4500 exhibitors across 2.75M net square feet (260K net square meters).

Now in its second year, CES Unveiled Amsterdam brought together 634 attendees from 19 countries, including 64 exhibitors from the Netherlands and surrounding regions. It will be followed by a similar CES Unveiled event in Paris on Oct. 3rd.

With the US Ambassador to the Netherlands, Pete Hoekstra, and Royal Highness Prince Constantijn van Oranje-Nassau attending as speakers, CES Unveiled reflects the industry’s political importance. For CES 2019, CTA will again partner with StartupDelta, an independent public-private partnership where the main innovation hubs in the Netherlands work with the ministries of Economic Affairs and Education Culture and Science, the startup community, and other partners. Representing The Netherland’s commitment to innovation, Prince Constantijn presented 55 Dutch companies who will participate in The Netherlands pavilion at Eureka Park, the startup hub of CES, during CES 2019.

In a further announcement, 31 tech companies from the Netherlands and the surrounding region were named CES 2019 Innovation Honorees. Among them, the Dutch company for charging solutions for electric cars, EVBox, was honored in the Smart Energy category and Qoobi for the High Performance Home Audio/Video category.

The remaining Innovation honorees will be announced at CES Unveiled Paris on October 3rd and CES Unveiled New York on November 8th.

During an Executive Forum on Innovations, future trends were presented—featuring 5G, voice activation and resilience (technologies that keep the world healthy, safe, warm, fed and secure in the face of adversity). CES 2019 will also have a wide array of automotive products on display in exhibition space of more than four soccer fields, making CES one of the biggest automotive shows in the world.

CTA also announced its new tourism area at CES 2019, an area to highlight the importance of technology and innovation in tourism. Attendees will be able to see and experience how technology helps customize and advance the travel experience. In addition to show floor exhibits, conference programming will dive into the role that tech plays in helping the global travel and tourism industry create personalized experiences that also provide sustainable economic growth opportunities for local communities.

Products to note from CES Unveiled Amsterdam:

During the event’s table top exhibition there were some interesting new product ideas. One, for example, is Glance Clock, the world’s first smart wall clock which shows important meetings, weather forecasts, fitness programs and more.

With Tic-Tag and a smart phone, people can show their presence and identification, opening doors, giving wi-fi access and personalizing visits to stores and restaurants including bonus programs (no more loyalty cards needed) and digital payments or digital check-in to events.

Bracelet is the first wearable that mimics a human touch by an actual gentle squeeze to make electronic contact more personal.

OnTracks is a pair of bracelets/guiding watches, one on each arm, to give navigation information for bikers, motorcyclists and runners without needing  to hold a smart phone. Maps are displayed, and each watch indicates the change of direction with vibration – as well as functioning as a smart watch.

Expivi is a web-based 3D configuration platform (at reasonable costs) which increases sales conversation in a shop with 3D presentations and lets customers experience products. They let resellers create configurable products in 3D in a webshop, visible on any device with a web browser. No plugins needed.

Another 3D product scanner shown, by th3rd also offers new opportunities for visual sales support: they can create digital 3D counterparts of people or products. They also hope to change the way eCommerce is done. Most products are used in a lot of different media assets, like photos, videos, visualisations, animations, 360º photos, holograms, VR and AR. All these assets are usually created separately by different departments—but th3rd says all these assets can be created using one of their high-resolution digital 3D models.