The Logitech MX Air Mouse

Hillcrest Labs is making some strides in getting its technology integrated with more partners. I was interested by the July 12 press release, announcing the Logitech MX Air Mouse. The functionality is definitely something we're keeping an eye on, and the concept supports one of our Areas of Opportunity in the Digital Lifestyle Market that we outlined at the CONNECTIONS 2007 conference. We told attendees to keep an eye out for a growing emphasis on search and navigation.

The funtionality embodied by MX Air Mouse makes it well positioned to take advantage of the ever-increasing blending of two-foot (home computer) and ten-foot entertainment and multimedia experiences. As the television evolves to embrace a much more rich multimedia experience (blending programming with Web content, personalized and user-generated content, and communications), you’re going to see navigational tools such as the program guide and traditional remote control evolve to embrace more search and navigational functionality. We expect that the EPG will morph to a much more graphics-centric guide, which will bring “point-and-click” requirements to the traditional remote control. At the same time, the home computer is already the multimedia hub for the home, and users are going to want to extend the functionality beyond the desk. So, the point-and-click functionality of the computer mouse – which has been constrained to the horizontal plane – is going to have to evolve to incorporate a much less-restrictive functionality.