Intel and Cap Gemini plan home energy management tablets

Chip-making giant Intel and the computer services company Cap Gemini are teaming up with the aim of delivering a power-saving energy management tablet, it has emerged.

Tablet PCs are becoming ever more commonly used as media consumption and communication devices but Intel and Cap Gemini are looking into innovative ways in which similar technology can be utilised.

Billions of pounds are expected to be invested in the realm of computer operated energy management systems over the next three or four years and the recently announced collaboration is aimed at giving the two firms involved a head start on their competition.

For its part, California-based Intel is setting in motion plans to have its chips incorporated into all manner of non-PC technology, from petrol pumps to exercise equipment in years to come.

As the company’s general manager of low-power embedded processors Joe Jensen told Bloomberg: “Energy is a big part of our project to extend the fringe of computing out to the next thing.”

Competition in the context of tablets being used as energy management systems is likely to come from various angles, with Siemens AG and Google among the major players looking seriously at the sector.

The main consumer sector of the tablet PC market has shaken up the overall mobile computing market in recent months, with strong sales of Apple’s iPad last year paving the way for a slew of rival slate devices to be made available in 2011.

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