Intel unveils tiny Curie system on a chip for next-gen wearables
Intel CEO Brian Krzanich plucked a button off his sport jacket and held it up during his CES 2015 keynote Tuesday night. It was not actually a button, but instead the successor to the postage stamp-sized Intel Edison Chip unveiled at last year’s CES.
Called Curie, the tiny computer has processing power, Bluetooth LE and sensors and is designed for future wearables. It should arrive in the second quarter of this year. Curie was just one of a number of new technologies Intel unveiled during its CES 2015 keynote. They all fell under Intel’s three umbrella areas: Computing Unleashed, Intelligence Everywhere, and the Wearable Revolution.
As part of the wearable revolution, Intel expects Curie to drive a new wave of wearable products, ones that can, like a jacket button, seamlessly integrate with our current fashions.
Intel CEO Brian Krzanich holds the new Dell Venue 8 7000
Image: Mashable, Lance Ulanoff
Krzanich also spent a substantial amount of time on the company’s new computer vision system RealSense, which falls under the Intelligence Everywhere rubric. It’s in Dell’s new 6.6 mm thin Venue 8 7000 tablet and can add photographic features like changing focus after a photo has been taken, as well as 3D mapping and gesture awareness.
Intel demos RealSense cameras that recognize gestures so u don’t have 2 touch ur tech when cooking #CES2015 #MashCES pic.twitter.com/j07cfjAuEB
— Lance Ulanoff (@LanceUlanoff) January 7, 2015
To demonstrate. Krzanich showed off a new Food Network recipe app that will allow cooks to work their way through a complex recipe without actually touching the device.
These Firefly drones use Intel’s RealSense to navigate around obstacles.
Image: Mashable, Lance Ulanoff
He also presented a little army of RealSense-equipped Firefly drones that could see objects and each other and use that motion capture information (and not GPS) to autonomously navigate their world. At one point Krzanich had a Firefly drone self-navigate through a large fake city built adjacent to the stage. The drone made it through without a hitch.
In the computing unleashed category, Krzanich demonstrated wireless charging capabilities and announced a new partnership with Marriott to bring it to select hotels this year.
Also on stage was Nexie, a wearable camera and drone, which won Intel’s “Make it Wearable” competition. Krzanich said the company will hold the competition again this year, but offered no further details.
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