AI Dominates CES, Shifting to Enterprise and Developer Gains Amidst Consumer Skepticism - Episode Hero Image

AI Dominates CES, Shifting to Enterprise and Developer Gains Amidst Consumer Skepticism

Intelligent Machines (Audio) · · Listen to Original Episode →
Original Title:

TL;DR

  • NVIDIA's new Vera Rubin platform offers a tenfold reduction in token cost and requires a quarter fewer GPUs for AI model training compared to its previous Blackwell platform, accelerating development timelines.
  • The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is shifting from a consumer-focused event to an enterprise technology showcase, with AI and industrial applications now dominating keynotes and pavilions.
  • Companies are increasingly exploring smaller, domain-specific, and world models for AI applications to reduce costs and improve efficiency, making AI more viable for businesses.
  • Consumer skepticism and trust issues surrounding AI are hindering adoption, with many users primarily engaging with AI for basic questions or entertainment rather than practical applications.
  • The development of AI-powered robots, particularly "physical AI" and humanoid robots, is progressing, but widespread consumer adoption is still hindered by high costs and complex dexterity challenges.
  • OpenAI's launch of ChatGPT Health, despite its stated intention to support, not replace, medical care, raises concerns about incentivizing ill-advised user behaviors and potential misinterpretations of health data.
  • AI-assisted coding tools like Claude Code are significantly accelerating development, enabling engineers to build complex systems in hours that previously took teams a year, highlighting a paradigm shift in software engineering.

Deep Dive

CES 2026 showcased a significant shift in the technology landscape, with Artificial Intelligence no longer confined to specialized enterprise applications but increasingly integrated into consumer gadgets and industrial innovation. This AI-centric approach, however, raises questions about its tangible benefits for everyday users, as the line between consumer electronics and enterprise solutions blurs.

The pervasive presence of AI at CES was undeniable, with chipmakers like NVIDIA, Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm all announcing new AI-capable hardware. NVIDIA, in particular, unveiled its Vera Rubin platform, promising a tenfold reduction in token costs for AI training and requiring a quarter fewer GPUs compared to its previous Blackwell platform. This advancement, six months ahead of schedule, underscores NVIDIA's dominant position in AI infrastructure, extending beyond mere chip manufacturing to providing the foundational layer for diverse AI models. The partnership with Siemens to create "AI factories" for optimized data centers further illustrates NVIDIA's expansive ambitions, aiming to streamline AI deployment with increased efficiency and reduced power consumption.

While consumer-facing AI products were present, many felt like solutions searching for a problem. Examples include smart refrigerators offering recipe suggestions based on contents and AI-powered children's toys designed for emotional support. The latter generated significant debate, raising concerns about privacy and unintended consequences, with a proposed California bill seeking to ban AI toys for children for four years due to potential misuse. This reflects a broader consumer skepticism towards AI, often perceived as either a better search engine or a source of amusing "slop."

Conversely, the most substantial momentum in AI appears to be in the enterprise sector. Siemens' keynote at CES highlighted the growing importance of industrial AI, with a focus on automation and productivity gains. The trend towards smaller, domain-specific, and world models signifies a move toward more cost-effective AI solutions that can run on older hardware, addressing the high expense of current AI development and potentially improving ROI for businesses. Developers are also experiencing a significant boost, with tools like Anthropic's Claude Code demonstrating the ability to generate complex code in a fraction of the time previously required, hinting at a future where AI-assisted coding becomes the norm.

The integration of AI into personal health is also a burgeoning area, exemplified by OpenAI's launch of ChatGPT Health. While intended to support, not replace, medical care, the platform's ability to process personal health data raises concerns about incentivizing potentially ill-advised behaviors, despite assurances of privacy and security. This development highlights the ongoing societal challenge of providing accessible and reliable health information, a vacuum that AI is increasingly attempting to fill, albeit with inherent risks.

Ultimately, the CES 2026 narrative suggests that while AI's potential is vast, its immediate and widespread benefit to the average consumer remains a work in progress. The focus is shifting towards more practical, specialized applications, particularly in enterprise and developer contexts, while consumer-facing AI grapples with user trust, practical utility, and the ethical implications of its integration into daily life.

Action Items

  • Audit AI product claims: Identify 3-5 specific claims from CES 2026 AI products and verify their feasibility against current technological limitations.
  • Develop AI risk assessment framework: Define 5-7 categories of potential AI risks (e.g., privacy, manipulation, unintended consequences) for consumer-facing AI products.
  • Track AI model cost efficiency: Measure the token cost and GPU requirements for training and inference of 2-3 domain-specific AI models to identify cost-saving opportunities.
  • Evaluate AI toy safety guidelines: Draft 3-4 core principles for the ethical development and deployment of AI-powered toys, focusing on child privacy and safety.
  • Analyze AI developer productivity gains: Quantify the time saved by developers using AI coding assistants for 2-3 common coding tasks to assess real-world impact.

Related Episodes

Key Quotes

"The wild thing in in vegas and I'll never forget it because we you know I never go there except for the you know consumer electronics show and before that comdex you know the trade shows didn't you go there for a rock buying thing or something that was too far but but but we go to we actually I should say that we have been going down there for entertainment like if there's a band we want to see and stuff but I remember going in the cab to McCarran the airport no I know I know and you'll see people walking to the airport dragging their luggage behind them and the cabbie says yeah those are those are the folks who even bet the cab money home that's when you know it did not go well"

This quote highlights the shift in the purpose of events like CES, moving from a focus on trade shows to entertainment. The anecdote about people betting their cab money home illustrates a past perception of failure at these events, contrasting with the current atmosphere.

"The last three years it's become a lot more there's a lot more things that are that are especially triggered by AI that have become part of the show and enterprises one of them we can talk about it but it it certainly feels like it's on the upswing again"

Jason Hiner points out that AI has revitalized CES, making it feel like it's on an upswing after a period of contraction. This suggests that AI is a significant driver of innovation and interest in the technology sector.

"I really haven't seen anybody yet that wants to buy a PC for the copilot button but there it is they're trying I want to take it off I can't figure out how to get it off my Lenovo X1 Carbon I'm using Linux I don't have copilot I don't want copilot but there's a button you can't get rid of it and it doesn't do anything either that's the other problem"

Jeff Jarvis expresses skepticism about the practical appeal of AI-specific buttons on PCs, like the "Copilot" button. His personal experience of being unable to remove or remap the button on his Linux system underscores a frustration with forced AI integration.

"Our mission is to uh to find and sort and and focus on the stuff that's actually real AI products and not you know AI washing or you know AI hype there there was plenty of it for sure"

Jason Hiner, from his perspective at The Deep View, emphasizes the challenge of discerning genuine AI products from mere marketing hype. This indicates a need for critical evaluation in the rapidly evolving AI landscape.

"The crazy thing about it is look they already have the most powerful chips and into to train AI for inference for all of the things right and so they are leading this industry by such a wide margin that they have 12 months of orders from what we've heard ahead like if they stop taking orders today they have everything that they make in 2026 they've already sold but they even with that and even with the competition having trouble to keep keeping up they what they announced was very surprising"

Jason Hiner describes NVIDIA's continued dominance in the AI chip market, noting their substantial order backlog and surprising advancements. This suggests NVIDIA's strong position and ongoing innovation despite their already leading status.

"I would almost think of it more less like a chip company they're going to still make chips they continue will continue but more like an infrastructure the infrastructure layer of AI right that all of these different models are going to run on their hardware not only LLMs but SLMs small language models domain specific models they are going to be in world models"

Jason Hiner reframes NVIDIA's identity, moving beyond just a chip manufacturer to an AI infrastructure provider. This broader perspective highlights their role in supporting a wide range of AI models and applications.

Resources

External Resources

Books

  • "Technohumanism: A Narrative and Aesthetic Design for Artificial Intelligence" by Pablo Sanguinetti - Mentioned as an argument for avoiding anthropomorphizing AI and using terms like "complex task processing" or "expert systems" instead.

Articles & Papers

  • "2025's AI-Fueled Scientific Breakthroughs" (Axios) - Discussed as a potential source for AI's impact on scientific advancements, though access was limited by a paywall.

People

  • Jeff Jarvis - Host and Professor Emeritus of Journalistic Innovation.
  • Paris Martineau - Host and Investigative Journalist at Consumer Reports.
  • Jason Heiner - Editor-in-Chief of The Deep Dive newsletter, providing insights from CES.
  • Jensen Huang - CEO of Nvidia, discussed for his keynotes and Nvidia's new platforms.
  • Vera Rubin - Mentioned in relation to Nvidia's new platform, "Vera Rubin."
  • Lisa Su - CEO of AMD, noted for her communication regarding chip power increases.
  • Yann LeCun - AI researcher, debated the nature of AI and its future development.
  • Demis Hassabis - CEO of DeepMind, debated the concept of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).
  • Andrej Karpathy - AI guru and former Tesla AI lead, noted for his feeling of being overwhelmed by the pace of AI development.
  • Jonathan Ross - Founder of Grok, inventor of Google's TPU, and now working with Nvidia.
  • Sunny Madra - Company President at Grok, who also left for Nvidia.
  • Samira Arora - Mentioned for a new company focused on health data access.
  • Cynthia Breazeal - MIT robotics researcher, associated with the Jibo social robot.
  • Mike Masnick - Discussed in relation to "vibe coding" and learning formats.
  • Nate B. Jones - AI strategist and product leader, recommended for his practical AI tutorials.
  • Gary Vaynerchuk - Mentioned in relation to promoting AI conferences.
  • Sacha Tell - Argued for rebranding AI and moving beyond the "slop" vs. "sophistication" debate.
  • Thomas Hague - Historian of technology, writing a book on the history of AI as a brand.
  • Darren Oki - Mentioned for creating a "Flappy Jeff" game and a tomato-throwing game.
  • Burke - Mentioned in chat for making constant eye contact.
  • Gizmo - Paris Martineau's cat.
  • Nicholas Cage - Celebrated for his birthday and his pyramid purchase.
  • John Dogan - Google Principal Engineer, reported on Claude Code's capabilities.
  • Bill Chalney - Creator of Claude Code, suggested self-checking features.
  • Joey De Villa - AI Developer Advocate, known for playing the accordion and AI-related songs.
  • Corey Doctorow - Mentioned in relation to Joey De Villa's work.
  • Steve Gibson - Mentioned in relation to finding personal data online.
  • Benino - Mentioned in relation to Japanese taxi door etiquette.
  • Abby - Jeff Jarvis's daughter, discussed regarding water usage.
  • Governor DeSantis - Florida Governor, discussed for his stance against AI advancement.
  • Karen House - Author of a book mentioned in relation to data center water usage.
  • CJ Trowbridge - Guest from a previous show, mentioned regarding Elon Musk's data centers.
  • Elon Musk - Discussed for XAI's funding, supercomputers, and a generated image.
  • M.G. Segler - Coined the term "hackquisition."
  • Leo Laporte - Host, discussed for his eye surgery and a tomato-throwing game.
  • Avshin - Co-teacher of Stanford's CME 295 course.
  • Sherwin - Co-teacher of Stanford's CME 295 course, twin brother of Avshin.

Organizations & Institutions

  • TWIT (This Week in Tech) - The network producing the podcast.
  • Intelligent Machines - The podcast series.
  • Consumer Reports - Paris Martineau's employer.
  • Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York - Jeff Jarvis's affiliation.
  • SUNY Stony Brook - Jeff Jarvis's affiliation.
  • Montclair State University - Jeff Jarvis's affiliation.
  • The Deep Dive - Jason Heiner's AI newsletter.
  • Consumer Technology Association (CTA) - Organizer of CES.
  • Intel - Chipmaker mentioned at CES.
  • AMD - Chipmaker mentioned at CES.
  • Qualcomm - Chipmaker mentioned at CES.
  • Nvidia - Chipmaker discussed extensively for its AI platforms and chips.
  • Dell - Laptop maker mentioned at CES.
  • Lenovo - Laptop maker mentioned at CES, specifically for Copilot+ PCs.
  • Microsoft - Mentioned in relation to Copilot.
  • Google - Mentioned for its AI models and hardware (TPU).
  • Siemens - Enterprise company partnering with Nvidia for AI data centers.
  • Foxconn - Hardware maker partnering with Nvidia and Siemens.
  • LG - Mentioned for its "Cloyd" butler robot.
  • CNet - Mentioned for reporting on the Cloyd robot.
  • LoveSense - Mentioned in relation to AI sex robots.
  • Ami - Mentioned as an AI companion/coworker.
  • Jibo - Social robot company.
  • Luca Robot - Product from the company that made Jibo.
  • Luca AI Cube - Product from the company that made Jibo.
  • Apple - Mentioned for its iPhone trade-in process and screen protector application.
  • Best Buy - Mentioned for purchasing a phone case.
  • Samsung - Mentioned for its AI refrigerator.
  • Monarch Money - Sponsor, a personal finance tool with AI features.
  • OpenAI - Company behind ChatGPT, discussed for its ChatGPT Health launch.
  • ChatGPT - AI model from OpenAI, discussed for its health features.
  • WebMD - Health information website, discussed in relation to AI for health.
  • Axios - News outlet, mentioned for an article on AI-fueled scientific breakthroughs.
  • DeleteMe - Sponsor, a service for removing personal data from data brokers.
  • Twit - The network producing the podcast.
  • Monarch - Sponsor, a personal finance tool.
  • Helix Sleep - Sponsor, a mattress company.
  • Disney Plus - Streaming service, mentioned for "Tron: Ares."
  • Stitch Fix - Sponsor, a personal styling service.
  • Botox - Mentioned in relation to chronic migraine treatment.
  • Zabar's - Deli, mentioned for shipping Bobka.
  • Zingerman's - Deli, mentioned for shipping Bobka.
  • New Orleans - City where Nicholas Cage purchased a pyramid.
  • Playboy Magazine - Mentioned for an interview with Nicholas Cage.
  • Google Pixel - Jeff Jarvis's new phone.
  • iPhone - Mentioned in relation to a daughter's new phone and trade-in.
  • Hetzner - Cloud hosting provider recommended by Claude.
  • Discord - Platform where a game image was found.
  • Grok (AI company) - Mentioned for issues with generating non-consensual images.
  • X (formerly Twitter) - Platform where Grok faced criticism.
  • XAI - Elon Musk's AI company, discussed for its funding round.
  • Colossus One and Two - XAI's supercomputers.
  • Huawei - Mentioned in relation to China's chip access.
  • Stanford University - Mentioned for its online AI courses.
  • MIT - Mentioned for its open courseware.
  • Three Blue One Brown - YouTube channel with AI courses.
  • Nate B. Jones' website - Mentioned for AI strategy and product leadership resources.
  • Axios AI Plus - Subscription service for Axios.
  • Twit TV - The network producing the podcast.
  • Twitch - Streaming platform.
  • X - Social media platform.
  • YouTube - Video platform.
  • LinkedIn - Professional networking platform.
  • Facebook - Social media platform.
  • Kick - Streaming platform.
  • Twit Discord - Community platform.
  • Anthropic - Company behind Claude, mentioned for leaving Google.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude MD - A system for storing Claude's conversation history.
  • Github - Code hosting platform.
  • NotebookLM - Google's AI tool for working with documents.
  • Gemini - Google's AI model.
  • ChatGPT - OpenAI's AI model.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • Claude Code - AI coding assistant.
  • Claude - AI model from Anthropic.
  • **

---
Handpicked links, AI-assisted summaries. Human judgment, machine efficiency.
This content is a personally curated review and synopsis derived from the original podcast episode.