I’m an innovation junkie, the further out there the better, but every so often it’s good to be reminded that just because a company has been around for a while, innovation is still possible.
Two
examples: LEGO® and Kodak.
Let’s
start with LEGO. If you are around any small children – and perhaps not even
all that small – you probably have seen them playing with Legos. Legos have been
around, in various incarnations, for longer than I’ve been alive, and that’s
saying something. Most adults watching kids assemble their Legos probably have
two reactions: “gosh, I wish they’d make them even more complicated” (note
to the oblivious reader – that was sarcastic), and “well, at least they’re not
on their screens.”
So I bet a
lot of us have a slightly surprised reaction to Lego’s announcement
today to CES 2026: LEGO SMART Play™.
The key innovation
is the SMART Brick, which “is packed with technologies that bring play to life
including sensors, accelerometers, light sensing and a sound sensor as well as
a miniature speaker driven by an onboard synthesiser, and much more, in
addition to easy wireless charging.” All that is powered by a custom chip,
which is smaller than one of the studs on a LEGO brick.
The LEGO
Group states: “Without any setup, SMART Bricks are magically ‘aware’ of each
other’s positions and orientations in 3D space, thanks to a novel,
high-accuracy, magnetic positioning system. They can also communicate via a
self-organising network that adapts to play. Advanced onboard systems let SMART
Bricks comprehend and interact with each other, as well as the fans building
with them.” “Magic” in this context meaning Bluetooth.
Nerdist calls
it “the most exciting innovation in screenless play ever.”
“For over 90 years, the LEGO Group has sparked imagination and creativity in children around the globe. As the world evolves, so do we— innovating to meet the play needs of each new generation. LEGO SMART Play™ is the next exciting chapter in our LEGO System in Play and something we are super excited about being able to bring to the world at this scale,” said Julia Goldin, Chief Product & Marketing Officer of the LEGO Group.
Tom
Donaldson, Senior Vice President & Head of Creative Play Lab at the LEGO
Group said “The launch of LEGO SMART Play™ brings creativity, technology, and
storytelling together to make building worlds and stories even more engaging,
and all without a screen. We truly believe we are setting a new standard for
interactive, imaginative experiences and can’t wait to see this innovation in
the hands of kids when we launch this year.”
LEGO is
partnering with Disney and Lucasfilm for three ‘All-In-One' LEGO Star Wars™
building sets, featuring SMART Bricks, SMART Tags, and Smart Minifigures that “power
the system and allow builders’ creations to become interactive, responding to
actions with appropriate sounds and behaviours, allowing for a truly responsive
play experience.” LEGO being LEGO, of course it’s all compatible with existing
LEGO Systems-in-Play.
The three
initial sets are building sets for the Red Wing X-Wing, the Darth Vader TIE
Fighter™, and the Throne Room Duel & A-Wing™, and will be available
March 1.
Nerdist’s Rotem Rusak raves:
But just because a form of play doesn’t involve screens doesn’t mean it can’t evolve or incorporate the cool technologies at our disposal today. LEGO SMART Play isn’t trying to transform LEGO into something it isn’t. Although its technology is awesome, the purpose of it isn’t just to create new tech, but to enhance the traditional play that has always been at the heart of the LEGO brand.
She adds: “This
is truly a beautiful way to use technology. The LEGO Group is putting
technological advancements to work to bolster something that is already so
good, rather than trying to rewrite or erase it, as we’ve seen happen in so
many other arenas.”
That’s a
beautiful way to do innovation.
Then there’s
Kodak. When I saw a headline in Digital Camera World naming Kodak the “comeback
king of 2025,” and another review calling the Kodak PIXPRO C1 as the hottest
camera of the year, my first reaction wasn’t “how nice for them,” but rather: “wait
-- Kodak is still around?”
To those of us of earlier generations, Kodak was the Apple of its day. Bold, innovative, well-designed, omnipresent. With the advent of digital cameras and then mobile phone cameras, though, it was generally thought to have lost its mojo and, indeed, I can be forgiven for assuming it had curled up into bankruptcy or worse. Don Stapley in DCW explains:
The comeback king has been revitalizing its fortunes largely by betting big on its ultra-cheap PixPro line of compact cameras – you know, the kind of camera we were all assured was dying out. The company that first made its name with point-and-shoot cameras a century ago is doing so once again.
Chris
Gampat’s review
in The Phoblographer gushes: “Make no mistake, the Kodak PIXPRO C1
is a camera that feels so much like the early iPhone if it was stuffed into a
camera body.” Mr. Gampat further tells us: “Photography doesn’t need to be that
serious all the time…The Kodak PIXPRO C1 is a wonderful reminder of that in a
time when the world around us is burning.”
Japanese photo
retailer Map Camera listed
the Kodak PixPro FZ55 as the best selling camera of the year. Kodak even has a global
licensing program, which, as The
Washington Post reports,
is particularly popular in South Korea.
 |
| Kodak PixPro FZ55. Credit: Kodak |
The point
is, with all its history and with all the headlines against it, Kodak is still
finding ways to innovate in its space, not by being the flashiest or having the
most modern tech, but building on its brand and delivering the experiences
customers are looking for.
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Not
everything has to be AI. Not everything even has to involve screens. Not
everything has to include the latest tech. Here’s to innovations that, as Ms.
Rusak says, “work to bolster something that is already so good, rather than
trying to rewrite or erase it.”
