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Microsoft’s SQL Server 2012 to launch on March 7

Microsoft’s SQL Server 2012 database will launch on March 7.

The launch date for SQL Server 2012 is out of the bag: It’s March 7.

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On the SQL Server 2012 Launch site, Microsoft is featuring the agenda of the Webcast timed to coincide with launch.

(Launch, as Microsoft historians know, may or may not equate to general availability. RTM, or release to manufacturing, also may precede or follow product launches at Microsoft these days. In the case of SQL Server 2008 R2, Microsoft’s release to manufacturing (RTM) of the product preceded by about a month the date on which most customers could actually get the bits.)

Microsoft Server and Tools chief Satya Nadella revealed last fall that SQL Server 2012 (codenamed “Denali”) would launch in the early part of 2012. Microsoft delivered the final public test build of SQL Server 2012 in November 2011.

The March 7 launch event topic list includes everything from big data, to StreamInsight complex event processing, to the new data-visualization and analysis tools that are part of the SQL Server 2012 release.

Microsoft already has revealed much of its SQL Server 2012 pricing and licensing plans, including availability of a new business-intelligence (BI) SKU.

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RIM’s new CEO wants to focus more on consumers

RIM’s new CEO, Thorsten Heins, wants the company to improve its product development while also becoming better at marketing, he said during a conference call on Monday.

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Heins is taking over from Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie, who had co-CEO roles and will remain with the company.

“I pledge to do everything possible to exceed the expectations of all of the company’s shareholders,” said Heins.

RIM’s decision to pick its new CEO from within the company makes it clear that it won’t budge from current strategy, which is based on its acquisition of the QNX operating system, according to Geoff Blaber, analyst at CCS Insight. QNX is already used on its PlayBook tablet, and will also be used on its smartphones with the arrival of BlackBerry 10, Blaber said.

“Eighteen months ago Mike and Jim took a bold step when we had to make a major decision around our future platform, and they purchased QNX to shepherd the transformation of the BlackBerry platform for the next decade,” Heins said. “Right now, with PlayBook 2.0 coming out in February, we are more confidant than ever that this was the right path to go.”

At first, Heins will focus on improving the company’s marketing efforts, which include hiring a new chief marketing officer as soon as possible, and the way it develops products.

“We need to be more marketing driven, and we need to be more consumer-oriented because that is where a lot of our growth is coming from,” said Heins.

RIM will also change how it develops products. The company has been innovating while developing the products, and that needs to stop, Heins said.

Innovation will take place with much more emphasis on prototyping, and RIM has great teams that can try new ideas out, he said.

“But when we say a product is defined … execution has to be really, really precise, with no churn in existing development programs,” said Heins.

Heins didn’t address rumors about RIM being acquired, but emphasized that its current model is the way forward.

“I will not in any way split this up or separate it into different businesses,” said Heins, adding that while he will listen to anyone who wants to license BlackBerry 10, it is not his main focus.

Picking a new CEO from within was the right decision, according to analysts.

“Heins has been the COO for some time. He has been at RIM for over four years now, and he has been leading the current product transition,” said Blaber. “It will be about delivering on the strategy they have already embarked on.”

Pete Cunningham, analyst at market research company Canalys agreed: “RIM has been stagnating and needed an injection of fresh leadership.”

Bringing someone in from the outside would have been riskier, according to Cunningham.

The big challenge now is to get BlackBerry 10 smartphones to market as soon as possible. In December, RIM said it would not start selling phones with the software platform until the “later part” of 2012, because it wanted to wait for the arrival of more advanced chipsets.

“It is hard to see that a change of leadership at the company can accelerate that schedule terribly much,” said Cunningham.

Products based on the BlackBerry 10 platform were expected to arrive earlier, and the delay has hurt RIM, according to Blaber.

“The reality is that creating a new platform, albeit be it on a pre-existing operating system in QNX, was always going to take some time,” said Blaber, who thinks that the development of the PlayBook distracted RIM’s engineering department to the detriment of new smartphones.

Another of Heins’ main challenges will also be to help RIM regain some of former glory in the U.S. The company watched its market share drop from 24 percent in the third quarter of 2010 to just 9 percent in the same period last year, according to Canalys.

However, the picture for RIM in other parts of the world is more positive. The Middle East and Africa and Southeast Asia were particular bright spots during the third quarter, Canalys said.

“There are a number of markets where BlackBerries are still selling really well, but the problem RIM has that everyone is focused on the U.S. market, and that is where is has taken a real beating,” said Cunningham.

It is likely to get worse before its gets better for RIM. Just like vendors such as Sony Ericsson, Motorola Mobility and HTC RIM struggled during the fourth quarter.

RIM has its BlackBerry World conference coming up at the beginning of May. That will be one of the first opportunities for Heins to present his vision for the company, and bring back some excitement.

“But that will not be an easy job,” said Cunningham.

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Microsoft gives details on mobile broadband improvements in Windows 8

Microsoft has given details on a variety of ways in which the upcoming Windows 8 operating system does a better job than its predecessors at letting users manage their connections to Wi-Fi and mobile broadband networks.

 

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“We looked at the fundamentals of wireless connectivity and re-engineered Windows 8 for a mobile and wireless future, going beyond incremental improvements,” reads a blog post published on Friday.

Windows 8 has been designed to simplify the process of connecting to mobile broadband networks and of managing those connections, including monitoring data usage and controlling costs.

“We knew that if we were to give you true mobility, that Wi-Fi alone would not be enough. Therefore, for Windows 8, we fully developed and integrated mobile broadband (MB) as a first-class connectivity experience within Windows — right alongside Wi-Fi,” wrote Billy Anders, a Microsoft group program manager and the blog post’s author.

Windows 7 allows users to connect to mobile broadband networks, but it’s up to users to find and install required drivers and software, including searching for them online at times.

Windows 8 comes with a common mobile-broadband class driver that works with devices from a variety of mobile operators and vendors, eliminating the need for users to install device driver software. “You just plug in the device and connect. The driver stays up to date via Windows Update,” Anders wrote.

Another enhancement in Windows 8 is that it provides native management within a single console of mobile broadband device functions, such as turning on and off their radios and configuring their connection settings. Previously, users had to perform these tasks in the individual management application for each device.

“Prior to Windows 8, you needed these applications to compensate for functionality not provided natively in Windows. This additional software confused and frustrated users by conflicting with the Windows connection manager, showing different networks, network status, and a separate user interface,” he wrote. “Windows 8 eliminates this confusion by providing simple, intuitive, and fully integrated radio and connection management.”

Wi-Fi and Bluetooth device functions can also be managed centrally from within Windows 8. The operating system’s network settings console also lets users establish connection priorities, so that their machine will automatically opt to, say, connect to a Wi-Fi network as the first option if available, and, if it’s not, then seek a mobile broadband connection.

Windows 8 also “learns” about the user’s connection priorities based on their actions. As a result, when returning from “standby” mode, a Windows 8 machine is able to reconnect faster than Windows 7 — in about a second.

“You do not have to do anything special for this — Windows just learns which networks you prefer and manages everything for you. This work was a major part of the architectural work we did in the networking stack and with our hardware partners,” Anders wrote.

Windows 8 has also been designed to help users be aware of mobile broadband data limits and costs. “Prior to Windows 8, we maintained consistent behavior on all types of networks relative to bandwidth usage. With Windows 8, we now take the cost of the network into consideration: we assume that mobile broadband networks have restrictive data caps with higher overage costs — vs. Wi-Fi –, and adjust networking behavior with these metered networks accordingly,” the post reads.

To help with managing mobile broadband data usage and costs, the Windows 8 task manager lists how much data specific applications have used up, so users are aware of which applications consume more data.

Oracle

Oracle calls school’s revised lawsuit over software project a ‘transparent ploy’

Oracle is asking a judge to throw out some of the claims made in a lawsuit filed against the vendor by Montclair State University over an allegedly failed ERP (enterprise-resource-planning) software project, according to a filing made this week in U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.

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MSU sued Oracle in May 2011, blaming the vendor for a series of problems and delays on the PeopleSoft project, which was supposed to replace 25-year-old legacy applications. The parties had signed a US$15.75 million contract for software and implementation services in 2009.

The New Jersey school ended up firing Oracle and has said completing the project will cost up to $20 million more than the original budget. Oracle has countersued, seeking money it says MSU owes it and blaming school officials for the project’s woes.

In December, the school filed an amended complaint that added new allegations, including that Oracle had conducted a “rigged” demonstration of the software package at issue.

Oracle’s motion this week responds to that filing, asking that its allegations of fraudulent inducement, gross negligent misrepresentation, grossly negligent performance of contractual obligations and willful anticipatory repudiation of contract be dismissed.

The school’s initial complaint “was premised on the alleged breach of the Consulting Agreement between Oracle and MSU,” Oracle wrote in its filing this week. “Now, recognizing that there was no breach by Oracle and that the contract contains valid and enforceable limitations of liability, MSU has conjured up claims which completely contradict the allegations it filed initially.”

This amounts to a “transparent ploy” that “fails as a matter of law because, try as it may, MSU cannot avoid the fully integrated, extensively negotiated contract which covers the exact terms that form the basis of MSU’s new tort claims,” Oracle added.

MSU’s amended complaint includes claims of wrongdoing by Oracle that are “directly contradicted by a number of contractual provisions,” according to the filing.

For example, the school had alleged that Oracle said its base PeopleSoft system for higher education institutions would satisfy 95 percent of MSU’s more than 3,000 business requirements.

But “the Consulting Agreement makes clear, however, that 596 of the 3,071 requirements laid out in Attachment C-1 of the Fixed Price Exhibit were ‘Not in Scope,’ that 60 of the requirements were designated as ‘Undefined,’ and 52 of the requirements were to be met by customization of the base product,” Oracle said. “Thus, the Consulting Agreement provides that roughly 23% of MSU’s requirements were not to be met by the Oracle base product.”

Oracle’s motion also denies MSU’s allegation that the software vendor misrepresented how much MSU staff and resources would be required to finish the project on Oracle’s proposed schedule.

Once again, the parties’ consulting agreement contradicts the allegation since its wording “put the onus on MSU, not Oracle, to assure that MSU had the required personnel and resources,” the filing states.

If the school can provide documentation for all of its allegations in the 60-plus-page amended complaint, “they’re going to be in a real strong position,” but it’s not yet clear how the case will play out, said one IT consultant and expert witness who has testified in several cases involving Oracle software.

For example, the amended complaint included a long list of original project requirements. “Many of them are stated in general enough terms that it’s entirely possible there was a legitimate misunderstanding on the part of Oracle as to what those requirements involved,” said the consultant, who requested anonymity because of current involvement in another case regarding Oracle.

To that end, Oracle’s motion to dismiss cites an “assumption” in the consulting agreement regarding the project requirements.

If the base PeopleSoft product could do “what” a particular requirement called for, but not “how” MSU wanted it addressed, “it is MSU’s responsibility to change MSU’s business process to accommodate how the base product’s business process addresses the requirement,” the motion states.

“It’s entirely possible when you look at what was delivered it will be a judgment call, rather than a clear-cut determination, as to whether what Oracle delivered met those requirements or not,” the consultant said.

MSU plans to oppose Oracle’s motion, according to a spokeswoman, who declined further comment.

Overall, the case presents a cautionary tale for vendors and software customers.

“This is why both sides should document the process,” said analyst Ray Wang, CEO of Constellation Research. “When a project goes down, fingers point everywhere.”

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Microsoft is rated third most-valuable brand in the world, but there are dangers signs ahead

Microsoft was just rated the third most-valuable brand in the world by Interbrand, but there are trouble signs ahead. The company’s brand value dipped 3%, the only top-tend brand to lose value in 2011. And both Apple and Google’s value surged during the year, with Apple’s value jumping 58% and Google’s 27%. At this rate, Google will soon surpass Microsoft and Apple won’t be far behind.

 

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Interbrand rates the value of the top 100 global brands, and publishes that list every year. The value of Microsoft’s brand, Interbrand found, was nearly $59.1 billion in 2011, down 3% from the year previous. It ranked behind Coca Cola, which was at number 1, and IBM at number 2.

Google came in at number 4, with a value of $55.3 billion. Its value surged 27% over last year. Its relative ranking is unchanged from last year.

Apple’s value, meanwhile, skyrocketed 58% in the past year, to nearly $33.5 billion, jumping to number 8, up from 17 a year ago.

Microsoft has been the number 3 most valuable brand since 2008. From 2000 to 2007, it had been ranked number 2, so its value relative to IBM has dipped slightly in the past decade, which supplanted Microsoft at the number 2 spot in 2008.

If Google and Apple keep growing at the same rate in 2011, and Microsoft slips 3% again, next year Google will beat out Microsoft at the number 2 spot, and Apple won’t be far behind.

Interbrand includes notes about each brand, and what it says about Microsoft accurately captures the company’s dilemma. After noting that Microsoft dominates operating systems, server software, and office suites, Interbrand notes:

This is both a blessing and a curse as the future of computing moves to the mobile space. Competitors continue to lure customers with mobile applications that turn individual devices into ecosystems. Google’s no-cost model will continue to put pressure on Microsoft’s profit margins, and Google Apps could threaten the Microsoft Office business with its competing cloud integration and collaborative tools.

I don’t agree that Google Apps will threaten Microsoft Office any time soon, but otherwise, I think Interbrand is on target. Interbrand also correctly rightly out that the Nokia deal, Windows 8, Kinect, and Xbox may help Microsoft in 2012.

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Windows 8 is a big risk to the consumer PC industry

Windows 8 represents the biggest change between versions of the operating system on most consumer PCs, and for better or worse it is going to be very important for that industry.

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The consumer PC industry is in the doldrums, with sales down at bothersome levels and a near-tangible lack of enthusiasm in the air. The Ultrabook is launching in full force, and while that is intended to reignite consumer passion it alone is not going to do the trick. Windows 8 will launch in the consumer market with great fanfare this year, and how the average PC buyer will react to an OS that is such a radical departure from past versions of Windows is a big question mark.

Adopting the Metro interface in Windows 8 is a major effort by Microsoft to make the PC OS appeal to the average consumer, but it’s not a given what that reaction will be. Fact is, some consumers have an aversion to new things that are radically different from what they are used to, and that may be especially the case with PCs that many already find intimidating.

One risk Microsoft has taken with the move to such a radically different interface in Metro is the message it sends about current versions of Windows. In a way, it is an admission to consumers that Windows 7 and older versions are too outdated, and not good enough for today’s PC user. This may bite them if the reaction to Metro in the mainstream market is not positive at launch.

PC makers depend on new versions of Windows to jumpstart sales, as most consumers upgrade the OS by buying new systems. Systems with Windows 7 will still be available for a while, but Windows 8 is going to be needed to really get systems flying off the shelves. Windows 8 is so different, if buyers are reluctant to make such a big change then system manufacturers are going to be in a real pickle. They won’t sell new systems with Windows 8 due to the radical changes, and they might not be able to continue selling PCs with the older Windows if it’s viewed as too outdated.

Microsoft has a lot riding on the market acceptance of Windows 8, but it’s not alone. PC makers have even more to lose if the market has a knee-jerk reaction to the Metro style.

The marketing message from Microsoft better be well-thought out for Windows 8. Consumers need to believe it is so much easier, so much better that they have to have it. This is critical to market acceptance for something so different. If this is left up to the OEMs, the message will end up being confusing at best and negative at worst. It is the most important marketing campaign Microsoft has ever undertaken, and it better already be under careful construction.

If Microsoft and OEMs begin the Windows 8 message to address how it not only covers “regular” PCs but fancy tablets and other forms, massive confusion will follow. Consumers don’t want to run the same Windows on PCs and tablets, they are likely only in the market for one or the other at a given time. Multiple device support, Intel and ARM support, touch and non-touch support is not the message for consumers. Just show what the buyer can do with Windows 8, nothing else.

Windows 8 is a big risk to the consumer PC industry, and a lot is riding on it. Microsoft better get it ready like no other Windows before, and sell it the right way. I am excited by Windows 8 and the Metro interface, but I’m not who they need to sell. It’s all the people who haven’t even seen Windows Phone yet that they need to convince how good Windows 8 will be, and that’s most everyone.

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Lumia 900 release window confirmed

One of the hottest devices to be announced at CES 2012 was Nokia’s Lumia 900. Nokia and Microsoft already gave us the lowdown on the big brother of the Lumia 800, but one detail that they left out was a release date. All we had to go on was “the next few months.” Now it appears that we can narrow down that timeframe: the Lumia 900 will be launching on AT&T in March.

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The info was spilled via the Nokia Developer portal. In an otherwise typical press release announcing the Lumia 900, it is revealed that the Lumia 900 “will become available exclusively through AT&T in March.”

The Lumia 900 is, by most people’s measures, a gorgeous phone. Its polycarbonate build is complemented by a 4.3-inch display that uses ClearBlack technology for darker darks. Its software is the real deal too, sporting the latest edition of Windows Phone, version 7.5 Mango. The Lumia 900 will run on AT&T’s burgeoning LTE network.

Microsoft and Nokia wanted to wait until after the 2011 holiday season to launch the first fruits of its collaboration. This was allegedly because it wanted to have its own moment in the spotlight. This may prove to be a smart strategy: apart from maybe Intel’s Medfield announcement, the Lumia 900′s unveiling may have been the biggest smartphone news to come out of CES 2012. March shouldn’t be a crowded field for big smartphone releases, though the expected release of the iPad 3 will surely dominate tech headlines in that month.

There still isn’t any pricing info for the Lumia 900, but it would be wise for Nokia and AT&T to keep it at $200. Verizon’s annoying habit of pricing its new LTE phones at $300 may work for the Android fans who always want the latest-and-greatest. But it wouldn’t be a wise pricing strategy for a platform that’s still unfamiliar to most Americans. $200 would match it up evenly with the iPhone, which is a comparison that Microsoft and Nokia will gladly accept.

IBM

IBM Research Determines Atomic Limits of Magnetic Memory

Punctuating 30 years of nanotechnology research, scientists from IBM Research (NYSE: IBM) have successfully demonstrated the ability to store information in as few as 12 magnetic atoms. This is significantly less than today’s disk drives, which use about one million atoms to store a single bit of information. The ability to manipulate matter by its most basic components – atom by atom – could lead to the vital understanding necessary to build smaller, faster and more energy-efficient devices.

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While silicon transistor technology has become cheaper, denser and more efficient, fundamental physical limitations suggest this path of conventional scaling is unsustainable. Alternative approaches are needed to continue the rapid pace of computing innovation.

By taking a novel approach and beginning at the smallest unit of data storage, the atom, scientists demonstrated magnetic storage that is at least 100 times denser than today’s hard disk drives and solid state memory chips. Future applications of nanostructures built one atom at a time, and that apply an unconventional form of magnetism called antiferromagnetism, could allow people and businesses to store 100 times more information in the same space.

“The chip industry will continue its pursuit of incremental scaling in semiconductor technology but, as components continue to shrink, the march continues to the inevitable end point: the atom. We’re taking the opposite approach and starting with the smallest unit — single atoms — to build computing devices one atom at a time.” said Andreas Heinrich, the lead investigator into atomic storage at IBM Research

How it Works

The most basic piece of information that a computer understands is a bit. Much like a light that can be switched on or off, a bit can have only one of two values: “1” or “0”. Until now, it was unknown how many atoms it would take to build a reliable magnetic memory bit.

With properties similar to those of magnets on a refrigerator, ferromagnets use a magnetic interaction between its constituent atoms that align all their spins – the origin of the atoms’ magnetism – in a single direction. Ferromagnets have worked well for magnetic data storage but a major obstacle for miniaturizing this down to atomic dimensions is the interaction of neighboring bits with each other. The magnetization of one magnetic bit can strongly affect that of its neighbor as a result of its magnetic field. Harnessing magnetic bits at the atomic scale to hold information or perform useful computing operations requires precise control of the interactions between the bits.

The scientists at IBM Research used a scanning tunneling microscope (STM) to atomically engineer a grouping of twelve antiferromagnetically coupled atoms that stored a bit of data for hours at low temperatures. Taking advantage of their inherent alternating magnetic spin directions, they demonstrated the ability to pack adjacent magnetic bits much closer together than was previously possible. This greatly increased the magnetic storage density without disrupting the state of neighboring bits.

Writing and reading a magnetic byte: this image shows a magnetic byte imaged 5 times in different magnetic states to store the ASCII code for each letter of the word THINK, a corporate mantra used by IBM since 1914. The team achieved this using 96 iron atoms − one bit was stored by 12 atoms and there are eight bits in each byte.

IBM and Nanotechnology Leadership

In the company’s 100 year history, IBM has invested in scientific research to shape the future of computing. Today’s announcement is a demonstration of the results garnered by IBM’s world-leading scientists and the company’s continual investment in and focus on exploratory research.

IBM Research has long been a leader in studying the properties of materials important to the information technology industry. For more than fifty years, scientists at IBM Research have laid the foundation of scientific knowledge that will be important for the future of IT and sought out discoveries that can advance existing technologies.

HP

Critics accuse Google of unfairly promoting Google+ in search results

The long-standing and persistent accusation that Google unfairly uses its search engine to promote its other online services is once again in the spotlight, triggered by new social search functionality the company is rolling out this week that more tightly links its search engine with its Google+ social networking site.

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The complaints have come from different quarters, including competitors and industry experts, and have focused on various arguments, but at bottom all charge Google with using its dominant search engine to deliberately boost Google+’s popularity, by giving Google+ pages and profiles an artificially prominent position in result pages.

One of the strongest arguments made so far comes from search engine expert Danny Sullivan, who described on Wednesday in his technology news site Search Engine Land how Google is now suggesting Google+ business pages that companies and public figures have set up on the site in a way that makes the Google+ pages much more prominent than similar pages these public figures and organizations have set up on competing social media sites.

Sullivan shows a variety of examples in which Google, via new query auto-complete suggestions for Google+ profiles and via the new Google+ People and Pages sidebar suggestions column, favors Google+ business pages over alternative ones that have more “fans” on Facebook and Twitter.

Sullivan ran his queries without being logged into his Google Account, and even using the Chrome browser’s “incognito” mode, to make sure that the Google search engine treated his queries as coming from a fairly generic user, and not tailored to him specifically.

“Is there anyone out there who still wants to say that being on Google+ doesn’t matter? Anyone? Because when being on Google+ means that you potentially can have your Google+ page leap to the top in those sidebar results, Google+ matters. It matters more than ever before,” he wrote, adding that Google is clearly “taking its weight in search and leveraging it to boost Google+ in a big way.”

Google, after many missteps in the social networking market, launched Google+ in mid-2011, and has made it clear, from CEO Larry Page on down, that Google+ will be a key, unifying product for the company, providing social sharing features and an identity layer across most Google online services.

However, there has been skepticism regarding the adoption and engagement level for Google+, especially when compared with social networking leader Facebook, which has more than 850 million active members who spend a lot of time on the site.

Google+ is also a rival to Twitter because Google+ can be used in similar ways as the microblogging phenomenon.

In fact, among the first to cry foul this week was Twitter. Its General Counsel Alex Macgillivray, who previously worked at Google, posted on his Twitter account that Tuesday was “a bad day for the Internet” after Google announced the new search functionality.

“Having been there, I can imagine the dissension @Google to search being warped this way,” he wrote. Twitter later followed Macgillivray’s post with a more formal statement, in which it reiterated and expanded on his complaint.

Meanwhile, Google answered back with a post on its main Google+ page, saying it was “a bit surprised by Twitter’s comments” because Twitter “chose not to renew their agreement with us last summer,” a reference to the now lapsed two-year deal which gave Google special access to Twitter’s “firehose” of real-time tweets.

However, as Sullivan and others have pointed out, Google has continued indexing Twitter posts and has a massive collection of them in its index, including links to the official accounts of public figures, celebrities and organizations.

Throughout the two-day flap, Facebook officials have remained mum. Facebook has its own special search arrangement with its partner Microsoft, which gives the Bing search engine access to certain data that is out of Google’s reach. While Facebook keeps most personal profile content off limits to search engines, its business profiles are public, as well as some other content, and thus available to Google. In fact, for a while Facebook has let individuals tag status updates as “public” and made those available to search engines — a good example of this is the site Your OpenBook, devoted exclusively to this type of personal, public status update.

In its announcement on Tuesday of the new social search features, described by the company as “Search, Plus Your World,” Google focused on new things its search users will be able to do when signed into their Google accounts: find Google+ posts and Picasa Web photos they and their contacts on those social media sites have shared not only publicly on the Web but also privately with each other.

This new functionality builds on the existing Google social search features, which let users logged into their Google Accounts see links in search results that their specific social media contacts tagged with the Google +1 button or shared publicly using a social media service.

Google didn’t respond to a request for comment about the controversy surrounding the new social search functionality.

HP

CES 2012: Following the new startups

Whenever I go to a large show such as CES, I always try to make time to look around on the fringes of the show, where the small and (hopefully) up-and-coming companies are. This year, the CEA pointed directly at some very early startups with its Eureka area, which featured companies and products which (at least most of them) aren’t quite ready for prime time, but which show potential for the future.

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Many of the companies seemed to be approaching tech from a for-fun point of view. For example, a company called Modular Robotics was showing electronic building blocks it calls Cubelets, which it is marketing as a toy for children but which I think not a few adults wouldn’t mind spending some time with — you attach power blocks, sensor blocks and action blocks together to make small robots that move, light up or perform other actions.

Another company was creating small robotic vehicles that used smartphones as the driving intelligence. Romotive lets you either preprogram your smartphone — Android or iOS — to drive a small wheeled device in a preprogrammed pattern, or you can use your tablet to direct its movements. According to one of its representative, Phu Nguyen, kits are now being sold to developers, and they hope to come out with a consumer-ready product in another year or so.

Another not-quite-ready startup showing at the Eureka area was nVolutions, which was developing cases that would power up your mobile phones using a small wheel attached to the back of the case that powers it via a spinning motion. It’s an interesting idea, certainly; one of several companies trying to figure out how people can keep their smartphone batteries going without having to constantly search for a power source.

Whether nVolutions, or any of the other startups showing this year, will make it will be interesting to follow. I’m glad that, despite the overwhelming presence of large companies at CES, there are still tiny, ambitious developers out there ready to enter the fray.