Business | Technology
Electronics makers seek gold in silver years
Remember when Grandma and Grandpa were confounded by the VCR? Today's senior citizens are surfing the web, gabbing on cell phones, Skyping with grandkids and firing up the Wii game console.
- By Michelle Maltais, Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service
- Published: 23:35 January 10, 2009
Las Vegas: Remember when Grandma and Grandpa were confounded by the VCR? Today's senior citizens are surfing the web, gabbing on cell phones, Skyping with grandkids and firing up the Wii game console.
When it comes to technology, older Americans have done a cultural reboot. "They're doing things that 80-year-olds weren't doing 15 years ago," said Howard Byck, senior vice-president for lifestyle products for AARP.
The Consumer Electronics Show hosted its inaugural Silvers Summit on Saturday, focusing on the intersection of baby boomers, their parents and technology.
The daylong seminar - with speakers from AARP; the University of California, Los Angeles, Memory and Aging Research Centre; Qualcomm Inc; and Google Inc - included a breakdown of just how grey we're getting - an estimated 1.2 billion people over the age 60 worldwide by 2025 - and what the potential impact is on technology and society. "CES is always miles of aisles of stuff without context," said Robin Raskin, a Silvers Summit co-founder. "Here is this market that is so ripe."
Byck called it "a constant battle" to get the attention of retailers and advertisers. But they are starting to take note that as baby boomers grey, the golden years could take on a whole new meaning for marketers. Seniors represent 75 per cent of the United States' wealth, AARP says, citing census data.
Plus, the boomer demographic is relatively tech savvy. More than seven million own gaming systems even though they aren't parents, and 29 million own digital video recorders, according to AARP.
The senior-specific products pitched at CES run the gamut from advanced to stripped-down.
Halo Monitoring's MyHalo strap is worn across the sternum and sends data on heart rate, temperature and other vitals to a wireless router that caregivers can access over the web. If the user falls, an alarm sounds on the router and calls for help go out.
Then there are simple cellphones. Clarity, a Plantronics Inc subsidiary, has made telephony products for people with hearing loss, many of them seniors, for about 30 years. When it came to making a cell phone recently, the company found its customers craved louder earpieces, bigger displays and fewer buttons.
The result, Clarity's C900, has four buttons on the front - for answering or calling, hanging up and scrolling through contacts - and a slide-out keypad. There's no text messaging or web surfing. But the phone does include a flashlight and a recessed emergency button that alerts pre-determined contacts.
"Boomers are going to demand that these things are there - for themselves and their parents," Raskin said.
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