A recent report from research consultancy Delta-ee has identified four battles shaping the future of the Internet of Things (IoT) in the housing sector.
The ‘connected home’ market is expected to be shaped by:
- What becomes the reference radio and communication protocol;
- The different ways to make devices interact with each other in the absence of true interoperability;
- Having a fixed in-home device which will replace the cloud in the temporary absence of internet in the house;
- Being at the centre of the house by providing an IoT platform.
Delta-ee reported that wi-fi is in a strong position to be the winning connected home communication protocol because it’s backed by a strong mobile industry, where billions of devices come with it already embedded. At the same time, wi-fi devices don’t require a gateway to connect to the cloud; this is another advantage as an extra white box to connect to the cloud can be expensive, hardly upgradable and seen as unnecessary in the eyes of consumers.
Arthur Jouannic, senior analyst, Delta-ee, said “Platforms with gateways such as Google’s Nest or Samsung’s Smart Things will need to justify the cost of this extra device. It will have to be able to run all the connected devices of the house when the internet connection is lost and to store information, download and process apps.”
