CEA announces 2013 Innovation Awards winners

Sony's full-frame compact camera is among the first wave of CEA Innovations Award winners for 2013.

(Credit: Lori Grunin/CNET)

NEW YORK -- Believe it or not, the 2013 Consumer Electronics Show is just eight weeks away. And that means it's time for the show's organizer, the Consumer Electronics Association, to begin drumming up excitement for the world's largest showcase of new gadgets and electronics. First up: the announcement today of the CEA's Best of Innovations 2013 Design and Engineering Award winners at the CES preview event in Manhattan.

The awards are given across 29 consumer electronics product categories, and include two new ones for 2013: "Accessible and Universal Design Technologies" and "Tech for a Better World."

"The CES Innovations Award highlights the robust innovation within the CE industry. Adding two new categories to the awards allows for more cutting-edge technologies to enter and be discovered," said Karen Chupka, CEA senior vice president, events and conferences, in a prepared statement. "This year's honorees have creative products with impressive design and engineering expertise. We look forward to seeing all these products at the 2013 International CES."

While this early slate of Innovations winners focuses mostly on current products, an expanded list of awards is usually announced on the eve of CES, which runs during the week of January 6, 2013,... [Read more]