New Report by IHS Technology Puts Bluetooth Smart at the Centre of Home Automation
While it’s been the next big thing for the past 50...
New Report by IHS Technology Puts Bluetooth Smart at the Centre of Home Automation
While it’s been the next big thing for the past 50 years, the smart home market is finally showing signs of going mainstream and Bluetooth Smart technology is making it happen. Research firm IHS Technology is now reporting the smart home market will grow by 56 per cent, compounded annually, in the next three years, with 190 million products shipping by 2018. IHS Technology projects that Bluetooth Smart will be the fastest growing connectivity technology in the segment over that period.
“Bluetooth Smart has the unique advantage of being the only low-power technology that is natively supported by all leading smartphones and tablets,†said Lee Ratliff, principal analyst for low-power wireless technologies at IHS Technology. “This ubiquity makes for a seamless user experience without requiring another device, like a hub, to translate between technologies.â€
In addition to native OS support from Apple, Android and Windows, the Bluetooth SIG has transformed the functionality of Bluetooth technology with the introduction of Bluetooth Smart. Bluetooth originally enabled a killer application’ – wireless audio – but through the Generic Attribute (GATT) profile, a cornerstone of Bluetooth Smart, developers now have unprecedented flexibility, turning Bluetooth into the killer enabler’ itself, spurring several billion-dollar industries including wearables, beacons, and now, smart home.
“While it seems like there is a new flavour-of-the-month technology for the smart home announced daily, we’ve been at this crossroads in other markets before and niche technologies simply cannot provide the convenience, efficiency, and security of the smart home to the masses,†said Suke Jawanda, Bluetooth SIG CMO. “A look at the wearables space shows the disruptive power Bluetooth Smart brings to a market – confined by niche, proprietary wireless technologies, the fitness tracking market shipped less than 15 million products in its early years. Now, relying heavily on Bluetooth Smart for connectivity, the market is set to ship more than 150 million by 2018. You need a trusted, massively adopted technology to take an emerging industry like smart home mainstream, and Bluetooth is the standard that the most innovative developers, and their customers, will count on.â€
www.bluetooth.com/smarthomemarket