Ultrabooks and Cloud Services Key Focus at This Year's CeBIT

This means that we're not seeing spectacular launches of new attractive devices from CeBIT, as was the case a dozen years ago. This does not necessarily mean that the Hannover show has become less significant for the industry, or less huge. CeBIT still insists it is sone of be the biggest global gathering of everyone who is directly or indirectly associated with IT, based on square meters of show space and the number of exhibitors.

Rather than high-profile commercials and attention-grabbing headlines in the media about new smartphones, tablets, notebooks, TV sets and other display-featuring devices, CeBIT is a place where industry trends are revealed in two more key areas: hardware (specifically chipsets, motherboards, graphic cards and other components of digital devices) and service providers (the companies that make data move between those modern electronic devices we take for granted every day.

Thus, Intel and AMD, as well as their partners who are a part of their business ecosystem are in the limelight during CeBIT on one hand, from Microsoft to Acer, ASUS, Dell, Samsung and Toshiba, while on the other hand, the focus will be on telecommunications companies as the most agile service and device vendor of today, with the central place being reserved for giants like the home Deutsche Telekom and mastodons like Huawei, Vodafone and others.

Intel is focusing the majority of its presence on the upcoming Ivy Brigade platform, which it is planning to place as the most solid bedrock of success regarding its ultrabook concept. All details about this platform are being clarified during CeBIT and thus a whole line of ultrabooks are being presented. Intel wants to show how far it has come on this matter in just two months? time, since CES was held, where it had a similar exhibition. Intel is hosting all ultrabook manufacturers and their prototypes for the upcoming season in its vast exhibition area.

AMD still does not have the right answer to such an aggressive campaign designed by Intel and will not try to compete with it at CeBIT, but AMD is pushing its Radeon HD 7800 with the code name Pitcairn. The HD 7800 series will be available in two models ? one being HD 7870 (Pitcairn XT) and the other, less powerful, being HD 7850 (Pitcairn Pro).

Other companies which follow the technological development dictated by Intel and AMD are providing an abundance of novelties in Hannover, thus we're seeing faster and more powerful peripheral devices, cooling systems, power supplies, housing and everything else that is largely in the background at shows like CES.

As far as trends go, the organizers have divided the conference part of CeBIT into four segments: All Things Smart, Flying the Cloud, Connect Your Lifestyle and Social Business. Cloud computing will be one of the most important subjects at CeBIT, it is not difficult to foresee this, and it is expected that many global economies will display their cloud services, especially when it comes to the mobile technologies and telecommunications sector. Deutsche Telekom has already announced a spectacular performance in this sense and with migrating its business into cloud, the telecommunications sector will also deal with the most radical changes that cloud brings to everyday life of consumers, especially regarding the so-called Over-the-Top solutions.

More precisely, OTT services include internet services that are being offered to end-users irrelevant of the company which provides landline or mobile Internet access, like IPTV or chat, even making telephone calls (OTT providers like Viber, WhatsApp and Skype have been in the limelight lately) because of which the telecommunications sector must necessarily redefine its offer in order to avert serious revenue losses.

This story began last week at MWC in Barcelona and will culminate in Hannover where the elite of business in cloud from all parts of the world will come together.

Display convergence is the latest trend that needs to be mentioned before CeBIT starts. It is becoming irrelevant via which display we are consuming digital contents while it is an everyday thing that we follow e-mails, browse the web, watch the news, play games or consume multimedia on the first screen that is in our reach, irrelevant of the fact whether it is a smartphone, a tablet, a notebook or a TV set.

This was also enabled by cloud, thus the technologies which even up the importance of various types of displays will be in the center of attention in Hannover, as well as those enabling 3D technology and multitouch on all screens, regardless of the fact whether operating systems like Windows 8 are in question, social services available on all screens or a third type of technology that will become an everyday occurrence in the near future.

Be sure to take a look at some of our other CeBIT 2012 coverage:

CeBIT 2012 Day 2: Ultrabooks Rival Tablets
CeBIT 2012 Day 3: New GPUs for New and Old Gamers