Korean Products to Sweep Innovation Awards

Korean companies are expecting to clean up at the CES 2012 Innovations Awards at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show to be held from January 10 to 13 next year in Las Vegas.

Since 2007, the organizer of the show has not disclosed the overall rankings by company, but industry experts believe Samsung and LG will retain their stranglehold at the top of the list. It hands out multiple awards in each category, for a total of 300, but does not differentiate them by rank.

The two companies have won awards there since they first threw their hats in the ring in the mid-2000s. They are handed out each year to the consumer technology manufactures and developers that submit the best products or most creative and innovative goods.

Samsung said on Wednesday it has won 30 Innovations Awards, including nine for its mobile phones, five for its TVs, another five for its laptops, four for monitors, and one each for its refrigerators and washing machines, taking up about 10 percent of all awards. It also won two Best of Innovations awards for one of its data storage devices and LCD panels.

In addition, four other Samsung products including its Transparent LCD Panel and Solar Netbook were awarded in the category of Eco-Design and Sustainable Technologies. Samsung earned 23 awards in 2009 and 37 in 2010.

Meanwhile, LG said it has won 12 Innovations Awards, including one Best of Innovations award for its Refrigerator with Blast Chiller Technology in the category of Major Home Appliances. LG picked up the same number of awards last year.

Three LG TV models were award-winners, as well as LG's smart TV upgrader, which enables ordinary television sets to be used like smart TVs, the company said. Its Blu-ray player and iPod docking speakers were also selected. The Revolution series of smartphones, which use fourth-generation LTE communications technology, also grabbed an award.

Lee Kwan-min, a professor at the University of Southern California, said, "Since the 2000s, Korean companies have begun to be recognized around the world for their product designs and creative ideas."

The U.S. Consumer Electronics Association and the Industrial Designers Society of America, which participated in selecting the award winners, said they plan to set up a separate exhibition hall for Innovations Honorees at the CES next year.