When you take into account that other exhibits included a lovemaking couch, that’s quite an achievement.
One exhibitor at the Geneva Inventions Show did a great job of featuring the potential of QR codes, this year, as the toddler shoes appeared to draw even more attention than a sofa that could automatically transform into a surface better designed for spur of the moment hanky-panky.
The toddler shoes featured quick response codes designed to help bring lost kids home again.
There were more than 750 exhibitors at the Geneva Inventions Show in Switzerland, representing 48 different countries. This event is the largest in the world dedicated exclusively to being a platform for new creations of all shapes and sizes. This year, the spotlight was stolen by one of the smallest among the inventions: toddler shoes featuring QR codes that contain the contact information of the parents. The idea is that if the child should ever wander off, anyone with a smartphone can scan the shoe and get a hold of the (likely very worried) parents, to arrange to reunite them.
These shoes and their QR codes were created by Lee An Youn, an inventor from South Korea.
In her own words, the inventor explained that “The QR code shoe is one way of preventing our children getting lost. It’s cheap, it’s quick and it’s easy to use.” Clearly, the media and visitors to the event agreed with her when it came to the innovation behind these shoes, as they have managed to gain significant attention from among a large number of other fascinating inventions.
This was the 44th International Exhibition of Inventions in Geneva and its press officer, Gerard Sermier, explained that there was sure to be something for everyone at the annual event. Though the true advantage was in attending in person, the internet made it possible for people from around the globe to be able to have a look at the very latest in innovations.
“But here, in one place, you meet inventors from across the world and you can speak directly to them,” explained Sermier, who watched an estimated 59,000 people make their way through the Palexpo Exhibition Centre which is located within the Geneva airport. “There are professionals, investors interested in buying patents or industrialists researching new products,” he said.
Many of the exhibitors are there with the goal of gaining one of the tens of millions of dollars worth of patent deals that are signed every year at this event. It won’t be long before the world finds out whether or not the QR codes added themselves to that list as well.
