IFA Global Press Conference 2019

The IFA Global Press Conference is a press event preceding the IFA trade fair. This year it was held in Andalusia, Spain.
Over 300 journalists from 55 countries around the world participated in the event.

One of the participants, of course, is the AVPlus magazine and the avplus.fi website.

But first, a few words about IFA

IFA, or the Internationale Funkausstellung Berlin, is one of the largest and oldest consumer electronics trade shows in Europe and the world at large.
The first IFA was already in 1924.

The IFA trade fair, held every year at the beginning of September, is a huge event:
The exhibition area consists of 24 large exhibition halls in a huge exhibition area. For example, last year there were 1814 exhibitors and over 240,000 visitors visited the event over 6 days!

If you’re interested in entertainment electronics, mobile devices, information technology, and home appliances, then you have to try this event.
This year the IFA takes place from September 6th to 11th.

And back to the IFA press conference

The IFA press conference consists of several top speakers from the industry and reports and forecasts from GFK, a market research company in the field. The event also includes companies from the industry; this year, for example, there was a representative from the German TV brand Metz, Sennheiser, and also from Finland – Safera Sense, a smart home product for home security and cooking.

Trends
The event covered a wide range of topics related to the development of consumer electronics. This included mobile devices, information technology, audio equipment, televisions, and even large and small home appliances.
Generally speaking, it can be said that the markets as a whole have grown in a satisfactory manner (the value of sales), and surprisingly the biggest growth was in Europe (+6%).

This has arisen primarily from the growth in sales of expensive premium models in the smartphone sector, smart home products, and from a surprising category of products such as cordless and dust-free vacuum cleaners (up % by as much as +45%). However, this only accounts for a percentage of total sales,

Consumers are ready and willing to purchase more expensive products than in the past. The “smart products” sector is perhaps more of a general trend that applies to all product categories and products that involve “intelligence”. These products are of wide interest. And sales of headphones have also continued to show strong growth, although their share of the overall market is only two percent.

But still, phones still dominate the overall market very strongly. No wonder stereo players are no longer sold at the same rate as they used to a decade or so ago.
According to the report, traditional audio segment sales %(still) decreased last year. The light was brought by the growth of Bluetooth speakers and, surprisingly, also the sales of speakers. However, soundbar speakers are also included in this category, which is certainly behind that growth. The graph below shows how the sales of different product groups are distributed.

Distribution of sales of various product groups of consumer electronics globally
Photo: GFK sales report 2018

If you are more interested in the topic, then Here you can find the entire iFA Global Press Conference 2109 material.
The report on the development and trends in consumer electronics is downloadable here.

The event also featured various product presentations

Metz Blue?
The German TV manufacturer Metz, highly regarded locally and certainly somewhat well-known in Finland as well, introduced a new product line called Metz Blue and is now expanding its distribution globally, including in Finland. Today, Metz is owned by the Chinese television and electronics manufacturer Skyworth.

The Metz Blue is now a more affordable range of TVs in the rebranded Metz Classic lineup, but they still have the same features and technology as the more expensive “real” Metzes. A bit confusing, but we’ll see what happens.

At least the design and features (e.g. the Android interface) seemed to be solid. The distribution in the Nordic countries (that is, also in Finland) should be clear in the autumn.
Further information: Metz Blue

Finally? Sennheiser soundbar
The most interesting product and news was the Sennheiser Ambeo soundbar speaker. Well, the renowned headphone and microphone manufacturer Sennheiser actually announced the results of the soundbar speaker it had first showcased three years ago, finally ready for sale.

This is a soundbar costing over 2,000 euros that includes entirely new technology for creating multi-channel sound from a single speaker system.
At least in the presentation held at the event, the speaker was able to create an incredibly spacious surround sound that was truly impressive, both for movies and music.
Ambeon should be available for sale before the summer. We are aiming to have such a test as soon as possible.
Further information: Sennheiser Ambeo

Intelligence from Finland
There was indeed also a Finnish company from Espoo, Safera.

Safera is known for its stove guard products and presented a new product called Safera Sense at the event; it could be called a smart cooking sensor (eng. Smart Cooking Sensor). We’ll see what product name this will eventually be sold under in Finland.

So, it’s an unit that contains several different sensors/sensors placed above the stove, which measures things like temperature, humidity, and air quality. The device warns you when the stove is left on and can even cut off the power to it. It tells you about the quality of the air, reminds you to use the stove fan, and together with an app, it can even tell you when the frying pan is hot enough and when the food is ready.
For more information: www.safera.fi