SIMO TCI

The 'connected planet' on view this week at Madrid's International Exhibition of Information Technology and Communications (SIMO TCI) showing how to connect almost anything to anything in a regular home environment largely showcases a Dutch company's audiovisual hardware.

However, aside from the 'transparent home,' Asian firms were everywhere at the exhibition which was bursting at the seams Friday with some 80,000 people set to attend over six days before it closed its doors Sunday.

The convergence buzz word even extends beyond human beings to animals, as Leon Lin, regional sales manager for Taiwanese Global Satellite Positioning company San Jose Navigation Inc., told AFP.

As crowds moved almost trance-like towards a dazzling array of plasma television screens and minute hard drive MP3 players Lin waxed lyrical over something far more minuscule, a GPS micro-tracker, yours for in the region of 500 dollars:

"You can use it to keep track of your pets - but I don't think that's going to be its main function. You phone it and get a message back telling you its latitude-longitude position.

People can put one of these under the dashboard of their car and if the vehicle is stolen, you immediately know where it is. You can use it for children's security so you know where they are."

Lin says admitting the next step is how to produce a combined GPS tracker cum mobile phone cum music machine a la fourth generation I-Pod.