Samsung-Incubated Startup 10kM’s AI-powered Digital Signage Solutions To Be Showcased At CES

December 30, 2024 by Dave Haynes

I have this perhaps old-fashioned attitude that the quality and functionality of a software company’s website offers some clues to the quality and functionality of that company’s products and services, so I am not overly enthused by a Korean generative AI content start-up Samsung is showcasing soon at CES in Las Vegas.

The Seoul firm 10kM.ai will be among 15 companies and projects coming out of Samsung Electronics’ ongoing C-Lab program, and its capabilities will be highlighted during CES at the Venetian Expo’s Eureka Park – a dedicated area for startups and entrepreneurs.

The tiny company – Linkedin suggests two people – has won a CES 2025 Innovation Award in the Mobile Devices, Accessories & Apps category, but the pitch is for a broader solution that includes Plug&Show engine, which “employs edge computing to transform standard displays into AI-powered digital signage solutions.”

“This CES recognition validates our mission to revolutionize corporate communications,” says Elton Kim, the start-up’s CEO, in PR. “Our AI technology dramatically reduces video production time and costs, enabling organizations to leverage powerful visual communication effectively.”

The company says its “Enterprise Video Platform revolutionizes video production through advanced AI automation, reducing production time from three days to five minutes. Its proprietary Gen&Edit model harnesses multiple foundation models to generate brand-compliant video content at scale, while the Plug&Show engine employs edge computing to transform standard displays into AI-powered digital signage solutions.”

Automated video production based on templates and rendering engines has been around for more than a decade – from industrial-grade stuff like US-based Dataclay and Israel’s SundaySky to more personalized, social media-focused platforms like Korea’s Shakr, which was acquired a few months back by another video content firm, Shuttlerock. Then there are template automation tools specifically for digital signage like Screenfeed Connect and creative team-focused automation tools like Plainly, from Serbia.

So I am thinking the twist with 10kM.ai has to be the generative AI part. And that may well be the case … except the company’s website barely works in English OR Korean. I even tried a different browser to see if that was maybe an issue. Nope. Click on the top navigation bar to learn more about Products, Technologies or Resources and nothing happens. Scroll down and the only thing that clicks out to another element is the contact us form.

This line also has me smirking: Plug&Show engine employs edge computing to transform standard displays into AI-powered digital signage solutions. Maybe there’s more to it, but this sounds like an app on a smart TV can drive a digital signage display … like scores of other CMS options already available and doing that.

With my skepticism noted, certainly there is a present and future that involves using AI’s rapidly evolving and expanding capabilities to increasingly automate video production. There may well be corporate markets and demands for this. But at scale, there are already well-established tools available, and at the entry level, a lot of small operators who want to build their own on-screen messaging are going to go with the templates the CMS they use already offers, rather than learn and pay extra for something different.

There is also the problem that going to the market as “a digital signage solution” immediately alienates scores of potential CMS software partners. As Samsung has done with its VXT CMS solution that directly competes with its software “partners.”

10kM.ai says its presence at CES represents “expansion into North American and Japanese markets, while pursuing strategic partnerships with Xiaomi for Chinese market entry.”