The Electric Salt Spoon, a tableware-type device that enhances the saltiness and umami of low-salt foods, has won two awards at the CES Innovation Awards® 2025 in the Digital Health and Accessibility & AgeTech categories, incorporating technology jointly developed by MIYASHITA Homei laboratory in the Department of Frontier Media Science, the School of Interdisciplinary Mathematical Sciences, Meiji University (UENO Masao, President) and Kirin Holdings Company, Limited (MINAKATA Takeshi, President & COO).
● About CES®
CES®, an exhibition event for products and services centered around electronic devices that is held in Las Vegas, U.S., every year in January, has been the world’s largest technology exhibition for more than 50 years since its opening in 1967.
The CES Innovation Awards® recognize products and services with outstanding design and technology, and the CES Innovation Awards® 2025 received a record number of more than 3,400 applications.
● About the two categories that received the award
Digital Health category: Focuses on healthcare and wellness, and includes devices for managing and analyzing health, as well as devices for detecting diseases and demonstrating treatment effects.
Accessibility & AgeTech Category: Covers products and services that are designed with consideration for the accessibility of all people, including those with disabilities, and products and services with innovative functions that support the independence of the elderly and others.
● Electric Salt Spoon
The Spoon is a tableware-type device that uses the power of a weak electric current to enhance the saltiness and umami of low-salt foods*1, so that you can enjoy meals such as soups and curries with reduced salt content.
Since 2019, MIYASHITA Homei laboratory at Meiji University has developed a unique current waveform that enhances the saltiness of low-salt foods in collaboration with Kirin Holdings Company, Limited. The Electric Salt Spoon, a tableware-type device equipped with this technology, has been sold by Kirin Holdings since May 2024*2.
*1 The 3rd Nerve Stimulation Interface research meeting (March 2023) “The effect of electrical taste waveforms that enhance the saltiness of low-salt foods on umami” There are individual differences in the experience of this. The way you perceive it may also differ depending on the dish.
*2 Kirin Holdings will begin online sales of "Electric Salt Spoon", a spoon that uses electricity to enhance salty and umami taste*1, on May 20.
● Co-developer comment: MIYASHITA Homei, Professor, Department of Frontier Media Science, School of Interdisciplinary Mathematical Sciences, Meiji University
CES events have been opportunities for the world’s first unveiling of visual media technologies such as the video tape recorder (1970) and DVD (1996), as well as audio media technologies such as the CD player (1981). I think of them as a hall of fame for the everyday life of the future. The fact that we have won an award at CES is nothing more than a sign that the “taste media” that changes the way we taste things is expected to become a part of our everyday lives in the future. We will continue to focus on research and social implementation so that we can meet this expectation.
≪Japanese version≫