Every year, people from the world over converge at one central point to celebrate the technological innovation exhibited at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), in Las Vegas—the largest consumer electronics show in the world, boasting more than 175,000 attendees.

This year’s show, held January 6-9, promises to be as engaging and interesting as any other year, but of particular interest to the readers here at Beauty Packaging, is a special industry highlight on technological innovation within the beauty space, organized and run by Living In Digital Times—a company founded in 2007 with the sole purpose of telling a story about technology in the context of a certain demographic or audience.

“Every year we add events depending on market trends that have begun to hit critical mass,” explains Robin Raskin, founder and CEO, Living In Digital Times (LDT).

Causing a Disruption

Critical mass, as Raskin describes it, is the point at which enough interest has been garnered on the part of consumers to warrant the creation of an event where a certain trend can be the focal point. In layman’s terms, it’s what all the chatter and hubbub is about. This year, Raskin sees technology infiltrating the beauty space further, causing a disruption in the way people shop. Specifically, she refers to the increase in at-home use products as compared to traditional patronizing of specialist services.

Discussing this, Raskin asserts, “You will see a disruption in the cosmetology and services area that will play out in different ways. These guys should be looking for ways to step up their game to offer high-tech services.”

With the beauty space preparing for a disruption, many companies want to have the opportunity to be associated with other thought-leaders in the space, and are thus interested in participating in this event. For this year’s highlight, Raskin, former PC Magazine editor, believes that critical mass has been reached where technology and beauty care converge. “We feel that people and the market are ready for this,” Raskin stated.

Beauty Tech Summit

LDT’s event, called Beauty Tech Summit, will exhibit products that feature—among other things—micro-derm abrasion, epilators, hair growth, diagnostics, bacteria killing blue light, teeth whiteners, and virtual/augmented beauty.

Brands will be hosting panel discussions and showcases all day Wednesday, including such companies as Philips, HairMax, FaceCake, and Foreo. These brands will be showcasing personal care products for face cleansing and anti-aging, at-home laser treatment for regenerative hair growth, an augmented nail polish and eye shadow app, and teeth whitening treatment, respectively.

LDT is also pleased to announce their partnership with Marie Claire magazine for this event; Marie Claire ran a special in December on the CES event from a woman’s point of view. They will be on the show floor at Beauty Tech Summit discussing the science of beauty.

In addition, Beautycon Media will be hosting a seminar giving makeup tips and explaining their high-tech, beauty service. They will be bringing in models to discuss and display high-tech products that range from freckle removal, to temporary tattoo application, and hair care.

Other brands of note are Illuminage Beauty–the joint venture of Unilever and Syneron Medical, creating at-home products for wrinkle and fine line removal; INAIL Printer– a 3D, intelligent, nail printer using inkjet technology; ModiFace—an outstanding virtual beauty mirror for trying on makeup, among many other uses such as experimenting with different brows and hair and eye color; Wired Beauty—a French company displaying their 3D masks that feature built-in sensors that detect which skin care products your face needs.

See these products in the slideshow above.

Industry Trends

Looking back over the past year, Raskin believes that three industry trends have really begun to uptick, leading toward this critical mass achievement. First, the best products in this space have had the best science. The products are shown to work and have a solid scientific grounding, allowing them to transition into dependable, at-home use devices—a huge development causing a huge disruption.

Second, personalization in product purchasing has seen substantial, forward movement, largely due to the improvement of virtual, or augmented, reality within the shopping experience.
Third, Raskin believes an increase in the frequency and popularity of personalized shopping is on the rise as well. By sending personal data and preferences to a shopping service, one is able to have assurance that an expert is selecting the best products based on the information provided, completely eliminating guesswork from the shopping experience.

“More and more, the things that you’d typically go out to get serviced are coming to the home. This is largely driven by a desire for convenience, but also cost savings,” states Raskin.

Telling A Story

Technology has served as the vehicle by which these advancements are made possible and as such, Raskin believes that they are worthy of receiving special attention. Her expectation is that attendees will come to the Beauty Tech Summit at CES out of curiosity, out of a desire to know what is going on, and LDT will be ready to tell the story, to paint a complete picture of what is happening in the beauty space, what to expect, and what you need to know.

This year, Raskin believes that augmented and virtual beauty will be the show’s bestseller because it is a technology capable of performing cross-industry and will be seen in such varied industries as sports and medicine in the near future.

Beauty Tech Summit’s exhibitions on beauty technology will be taking place Wednesday, January 6 on the center stage at Tech West (the Venetian Ballroom).

For additional event details or registration information, visit CES  or BeautyTechSummit.


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