As CES continues to expand its footprint and influence as the global stage for technology innovation, exhibitors are spreading themselves out across the multiple venues of CES 2020 in Las Vegas. Visitors to the show, which opens today and fills almost 3 million square feet of space with more than 4,400 exhibiting companies, will find some surprises when they look for returning CES veterans such as Intel and Qualcomm in familiar places and instead find them spread out across show locations, while discovering an unusually large presence from other companies such as IBM and John Deere. 

The logistics are massive with the show located in three separate areas: Tech East at The Las Vegas Convention Center and Westgate Hotel; Tech West at the Sands Expo Hall, Venetian, Palazzo, Encore and Wynn Hotels; and Tech South at the Aria, Vdara, and Park MGM and Park Theater.

The venues aggregate generally related product categories. Central Hall in Tech East is where you will still find the major players in the traditional consumer electronics space with big brands LG, Samsung, and Sony commanding giant booths hidden behind curtains until the show floor opens. 

Joining them this year is a whole new section devoted to travel and hospitality. In the middle of the hall is IBM, a company that has worked extensively with this year’s keynoter, Delta Air Lines. IBM’s booth theme is “Let’s Put Smart to Work,” and its message carries into a larger than expected presence in the South Hall of artificial intelligence companies.

The size of the space may be a factor of the kind of companies with displays. John Deere’s booth is dominated by a giant tractor equipped with fully deployed boom arms stretching a hundred feet across. Another company, Doosan, is a South Korean-based manufacturer of construction equipment. Next door to the AI area is robotics and drones.

But for the truly monumental drone displays, the North Hall is where you will find the future of transportation. In what Steve Koenig, CTA vice president of research called “the next mile” in his CES Trends presentation, Bell Textron and Hyundai show their flying car prototypes. A little more down to earth, Ford, Fiat Chrysler, Audi, Honda, and Nissan, among others, show their next generation of transportation and mobility. The connected car is powered in part by technology from companies like Qualcomm, which located its booth in North Hall this year.

Qualcomm’s longtime neighbor in the Central Hall was Intel. They, too, decided to present themselves in different areas, with their largest presence at Tech West, in the Venetian’s Delfino ballroom meeting space. Their choice of Tech West aligns them with that venue’s emphasis on emerging technologies.

As CTA prepared to open the show, they called attention to what is new for CES 2020 in a recent press release. Among their highlights: there will be 1,550 new exhibitors, including several non-traditional companies such as Impossible Foods and Procter & Gamble and 1,200 startups, early-stage companies, countries and university groups participating in Eureka Park.

ETC analysts will explore Tech West and Eureka Park and report on the most interesting, promising and relevant innovations.