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Speedy undershoes among inventions showcased in Geneva

Malcolm Curtis
Malcolm Curtis - [email protected]
Speedy undershoes among inventions showcased in Geneva
Rollkers in action. Photo: Rollkers Facebook page

Rollkers, lightweight undershoes that allow you to walk at speeds of 12 kilometres an hour, are among the more unusual products on display at Geneva’s 41st annual exhibition of inventions, which began on Wednesday.

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The five-day exhibition, held at the Palexpo centre, is highlighting 1,000 inventions this year, including the walking aids, and claims to be the biggest of its kind in the world.

The French manufacturer of the Rollkers says the devices, which look similar to roller skates, are compact and enable you to safely breeze around town at double speed with “no training and no external energy”.

To accelerate you simply push the tip of the foot, the product’s backers say on their website.

To brake, you “tighten the toe on the ground” and “no loss of balance” is promised by the inventor, who like many of the exhibitors is seeking investors to expand development of the product.

Other products at the show include the Twisbee, a rotating ironing board that you can place on a table and turn 360 degrees by hand.

Its “ergonomic shape makes ironing fast and impeccably finished, especially for shirts and trousers,” say the backers of this invention, also from France.

One of the highlighted Swiss inventions on display is a hand boring tool designed for carpenters that allows you to easily make rows of regularly spaced holes.

From Hong Kong there is a portable “Solsource” solar cooker, a contraption that harnesses the sun’s rays to allow for meals to be heated up in a “safe and efficient” way.

Organizers say they expect 60,000 people will visit the show to view inventions from 45 countries.

One of the roles of the expo is to bring together inventors with potential investors and to promote marketing of new products.

“For five days, Geneva will be without doubt the capital of invention and the world’s largest meeting place for innovation,” Jean-Luc Vincent, founder and president of the exhibition told a press conference last week. 

“Nowhere else exists an exhibition where it is possible to find such a great concentration of inventions in all areas of human activity.”

Vincent said that every year more than 45 percent of inventions shown at the show become the object of licensing contracts.

The exhibition runs until Sunday.

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