Standout Technology Products of 2024

There have been a lot of great products released this year and we’ll be highlighting some of them. However, unlike most years when the decision was difficult, one product stood out above the rest as revolutionary. What made it special was that it was a bold bet that paid off and helped the manufacturer become one of the That The most valuable company in the world.

I don’t usually write a Product of the Week column since it’s dedicated to Product of the Year, but I came across a confection that I’m almost addicted to thanks to my love of dark chocolate, so I have to squeeze it in. It’s from a small company called Sweet as Fudge. So, before we jump back to 2024 and discuss some standout products, let’s talk about that chocolate.

Product Dark chocolate malt balls, triple dipped. There is also a sugar-free version that is surprisingly good. A pound costs about $15, but these things are so good. I store them in the refrigerator so they melt more slowly in my mouth. If you’re a chocolate and malt lover (I prefer chocolate malt in the summer), give this a try this holiday season.

Now let’s move on to the main event. We’ll start with the contenders that didn’t make it to the top of my list and end with the ones that earned Product of the Year honors.

Fisker Ocean

Image credit: Fisker

It’s a shame this company didn’t survive this year, but the Fisker Ocean I was planning on buying was probably the best electric SUV on paper. It had a lot of cool, unique features, like a solar-powered roof and a lift-up table so the driver could grab a snack or eat in the car without making a mess.

This eSUV was well designed and had a decent range and I thought it was one of the best looking cars on the market. Operating inefficiencies and apparently some financial mismanagement killed the company and the car. Rest in peace Fisker.

2025 Audi RS e-tron® GT Performance

Image credit: Audi Communications

I bought a used 2022 Audi e-tron GT after Fisker went bankrupt. Right after I bought it, Audi released 2025 modeland it’s a beast. It has almost 1000 hp which gives it incredible performance (more than I need since my base car is quite fast), hydraulic suspension allowing almost instantaneous height adjustment and the car is beautiful.

Oh, they added about 100 miles to my car’s range, making it much more useful as a daily driver. At $171,000 it’s out of my budget, but wow, what a car!

Hyundai Ionic 5 N

Image credit: Hyundai

I think Hyundai’s approach to Ionic 5 N An electric car is an option for those who miss the engine sound and gear shifts of a manual car. This Hyundai is perhaps the most fun electric car in the world. It does a good job of simulating engine sounds, and when shifting gears it feels like you’re shifting a car, even though it’s simulated and actually makes the car slower. But it’s incredibly fun to drive and quite quick (0 to 60 in 3.25 seconds).

The Hyundai Ioniq 5 N is inexpensive for a performance car under $70,000, and it’s probably faster than your buddy’s much more expensive exotic car.

ChatGPT by OpenAI

Wow, talk about a proposal that changed the world! ChatGPT is the core technology of Apple and Microsoft in the field of artificial intelligence. Its Dall-E imaging capabilities are impressive (as is Google’s Gemini, which I also use), and it has changed the way many of us write software, create images, and even write entire works.

ChatGPT is growing incredibly fast, and thanks to artificial general intelligence (AGI), it promises to change the way we create what we read. ChatGPT and its peers are starting to change what we watch. This is truly a revolutionary platform, although Google’s Gemini Advanced is not far behind. Although ChatGPT wasn’t launched until 2024, this year it became the backbone of Microsoft and Apple’s massive artificial intelligence efforts.

Windows 365 Link

Ever since the PC came out, we’ve essentially been asking for a return to terminals. We love the freedom that PCs give us, but we’re not crazy about the complexity of maintaining them ourselves, especially on a large scale. Microsoft helped create the problem and, to be fair, has mitigated many of the problems associated with it by improving Windows.

However, Windows 365 Link it is an almost instantaneous terminal-like device that promises and basically delivers a Windows experience with the reliability and simplicity of a terminal. It’s sort of a product of Back to the Future and sort of a man bites a dog story. I expect this will ultimately be the future of the PC.

bluesky

Ever since Elon Musk bought Twitter, many of us have been looking for an alternative. Every time we got excited about a new job, we were disappointed.

bluesky it was the closest thing to a better Twitter at the moment and more and more people I know have switched to it. Given its distributed architecture, it also has some technical advantages over X/Twitter.

In my opinion, its moderation is better than Twitter. This was a huge step in the right direction and I hope it makes it into our future.

Google Pixel 9 Pro Foldable

Google Pixel 9 Pro Foldable This is the phone I carry with me now and it’s amazing. Phone updates have been helpful. It locks if it moves suddenly, as if, for example, someone had stolen it. It also locks you out if you’re reading on a plane as it takes off, but you can just log in again. It folds up into a small tablet, so if I don’t have my glasses handy, I can still make the text large enough to read. Speaking of reading, this is the best e-reader alternative since Microsoft Duo.

I wish Google would use a Qualcomm Snapdragon instead of its own processor, but the difference isn’t as bad as with the first Fold. I just love this phone.

Tri-fold smartphone Huawei Mate XT

Huawei showed remarkable ingenuity in overcoming technological limitations to produce one of the world’s most desirable smartphones, despite some initial growing pains as it was almost an entirely new platform.

Considering that Huawei was not allowed to buy this technology in the US, this triple-screen phone, which has increased in size from the iPhone to the iPad, is a technical marvel. It demonstrates where we’re likely to go with phones and differentiate ourselves from competing devices this year.

Huawei continues to impress given the challenges caused by the conflicts between the US and China this year. Impressive work.

Lenovo Auto Twist AI PC Concept

Lenovo is another company that stood out this year for its innovation. The product that caught my attention the most was the ThinkBook Auto-Twist AI PC concept.

What makes this computer different is that it automatically rotates the screen and built-in camera depending on where you are in the room. This feature is especially useful for those of us who have to move around during team meetings or when you need to watch a training video while doing something else.

Watching the screen automatically rotate and stay focused on the user was amazing. As AI advances, I expect we’ll see even more innovation when it comes to AI-powered PCs.

HP Print AI

For me, 2024 was marked by innovation in the field of artificial intelligence. HP’s Print AI offering, released in September, directly addresses many printer issues by automatically formatting pages without cutting borders and arranging data and graphics so that every print job is perfect.

We’ve all had problems printing a document where it doesn’t fold properly. Spreadsheets are the worst, often printing one row or column per page and then throwing away hundreds of useless printed copies that make little to no sense, for example:

Image credit: HP

HP Print AI automatically formats print jobs, so your printed document will be useful. Artificial intelligence analyzes your print job based on past training to determine the optimal format. It then automatically adjusts this result so that each print job is as perfect as the AI ​​can make it, for example:

Image credit: HP

Printer technology needs to be embraced in this decade and this software from HP should do it. Expect to see more advances like this from many companies that plan to use AI to address customer dissatisfaction with their products.

Disney BDX Robots

BDX robots are part of Project Bolshoi and use Nvidia Jetson robotic technology. you will see them at the Disney parksand over time you will be able to buy it.

This little guy is the closest thing to a real Star Wars robot I’ve ever encountered. I wish I’d been smart enough to invest in Lucas Films then, rather than spend money going back and forth to see the first Star Wars movie. BDX showed how far robotics has come, and in 2025 we will see many amazing robots available for purchase.

NVIDIA Blackwell GPU

Image credit: Nvidia

When Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang first introduced by Blackwellit was a fantastic event demonstrating how a company should deliver a revolutionary product. This GPU is huge in terms of performance and power requirements, and it is causing a giant shift from air to water cooling in cloud and enterprise data centers as the world moves to artificial intelligence.

The backstory to this piece and all of Nvidia’s AI efforts is the stuff of legend. Back in the early 2000s, when only IBM was really working with artificial intelligence, Jensen Huang became convinced that this was an event in the much nearer future. For much of the next 20 years, Nvidia’s financial performance declined as the company relied heavily on AI. If Juan hadn’t been the founder, he would likely have been fired.

Then OpenAI asked for help, and Nvidia provided it. Thanks to Nvidia, we now have generative AI that works. The Blackwell is the current culmination of this work: a massive GPU that’s extremely power-hungry yet incredibly efficient. Although it consumes a ton of power, it does far more work than any group of other GPUs or NPUs with the same power.

The AMD Threadripper processor was equally innovative, but it was designed to meet existing market needs. Nvidia was working on Blackwell before AI was a market, but it never got done. By taking a seemingly unwarranted risk and running with it, Nvidia caught its competitors sleeping, and now Nvidia is almost synonymous with artificial intelligence.

Back when pensions existed, CEO compensation was more reasonable, and boards were more supportive of long-term strategic moves, such efforts would not have been unusual. But in the modern world you simply don’t see this.

Nvidia’s efforts at Blackwell give me hope that the US can return to a more strategic future. This has caught the attention of a world increasingly focused and concerned about artificial intelligence. Blackwell delivered a once-in-a-generation breakthrough in performance and a huge bet that could have gone wrong, which is why I chose it for Product of the Year.