Necessity, the mother of invention?

Is necessity truly the mother of invention? Or, do we invent needs?

Today, Sony announced a breakthrough in TV technology, with a working model of a flat-screen, thin full-color screen that bends like a piece of paper! It has been reported that Sony is yet to decide how it will commercialize this innovation. A wearable TV-fabric and wrist-wrap TV are amongst some early application ideas being bounced about. One thing can be certain, once Sony invents a need, the anticipated customer demand will accelerate the creation of complementing products and programming to piggy back on this technology.

For all the technical innovation in broadcasting technology supported by FCC mandates on High Definition transmission, the form factor of current display unit limits where and how one can enjoy the medium and the message. Plasma TVs are bulky and fragile, while LCDs have viewing angle limitations. We end up getting these newer generation TV's and hosting them in a 19th century fashion, rooted to a spot around which we congregate; rather than having the flexibility of letting the TV follow us to where we want to 'enjoy' it.

Ideal application? Thin-screen large TVs that weigh no more than 5 pounds, wall mountable on simple picture-frame mounts, with user-swappable designer frames with fully-integrated HD antennas, wireless connectivity with peripheral AV equipment and powered by rechargeable batteries that can be swapped out. Further, imagine if TV's became as portable as laptops and reach the level of personalization that we are used to with computing technology. We might take to switching TV sets out as fast as we switch the channels on the flipper!

That, indeed, would be a need invented.

Of course, when you head over to TiECON East 2007, you will get to hear about The War for the Digital Home with Rod Randall (Partner, Vesbridge Partners), Nandhu Nandhakumar (SVP, LG Electronics), Jeff Binder (Senior Director, Motorola), Gunjan Bhow (VP, Marketing & Product Mgt, Actiontec Electronics), Ofer Vilenski (CEO, Jung Software) and Brian Mahony (VP, Marketing, Espial) sharing their thoughts on Saturday June 16th.

The conference starts at 6 PM on Thursday, June 14 at the Hynes Convention Center with Reed Hunt, Intel Board Member / Former FCC Chairman / Author kicking off the event.

Can you afford to miss this and spend the next 365 days until the next TiECON fretting over it?

sai at obviousideas dot com