Chinese wellness tech innovations gain popularity at CES 2025

With a videographer and an assistant at his side, Spanish YouTube tech influencer Nikias Molina demonstrated an innovative electric toothbrush at a bustling Consumer Electronics Show booth.

The device's standout feature – an up-and-down oscillating motion recommended by dentists – had captured his attention.

"It makes sense and is easy to use," said Molina, who has amassed a following of 343,000 subscribers on the video-sharing platform.

"The toothbrush industry is very crowded, and there's a lot of competition ... but I think they've really differentiated themselves a lot," Molina told Xinhua.

The toothbrush, manufactured by Chinese company Laifen, attracted many social media content creators to its exhibition space.

Shili Shao, Laifen's vice president for international sales and marketing, was particularly pleased that these influencers discovered the booth on their own.

"The interest from social media influencers has been remarkable," he said. "After experiencing strong growth in the Chinese market, we're now looking to expand our presence in the United States."

According to a recent report by the market research firm Grand View Research, the global digital health market is expected to reach 946 billion US dollars by 2030, with a compound annual growth rate of 21.9 percent from 2024 to 2030.

The report identifies multiple factors driving this expansion, including widespread smartphone adoption, enhanced Internet connectivity, and improved IT infrastructure.

At this year's CES, which concluded Friday, Chinese companies emerged as dominant players in the digital health and wellness sector, garnering substantial attention with their innovative offerings.

David Hogan, vice president of Chinese smart hearing aid company Elehear, was "busy" with media requests.

"Within the first hour of the exhibition, we'd already conducted three video interviews, far exceeding our expectations," Hogan told Xinhua.

Elehear produces over-the-counter hearing aids that blend wellness functionality with lifestyle features, including music streaming and AI-enabled language translation.

"When you look at health and wellness, people are always trying to improve their life," he said, adding that their product is positioned as "an affordable solution for the masses."

"A conventional prescribed hearing aid can cost from 4,000 to 8,000 US dollars; our device is just 399 dollars," said Hogan.

Even established players like BOE Technology Group, a leading Chinese display panel manufacturer, have ventured into digital health.

The company's exhibit featured an intelligent steering wheel capable of monitoring drivers' heart rates as part of their "intelligent cockpit technologies."

Su Ning, chief executive officer of BOE Varitronix, the group's automotive display and system business platform, highlighted how increased computing power in smart cabins, alongside advanced sensors and displays, will enable more health-related features in vehicles.

"Our decade-long investment in health care initiatives has focused on integrating medical expertise with technological capabilities," he explained.

Su said the computing power, sensors, and displays of the automotive systems can support features like online hospitals and remote medical consultations.

Cars can provide consistent health monitoring and data collection, serving as valuable touchpoints for long-term preventive health care management, he added.

Looking ahead, the company plans to enhance the smart steering wheel's capabilities to include blood pressure monitoring. Using AI technology, the company could develop further applications, such as conducting heart health analysis and integrating hospital systems to provide users with additional services, Su said.

Nancy Brown, chief executive officer of the American Heart Association, expressed optimism about applying technologies to the car cockpit.

"Imagine if every day when people are driving around, we could get early signals of who might be at risk for atrial fibrillation or having a stroke," she told Xinhua at the CES. "That's very exciting and very promising."