Big Tech sign-up to make smart home standards

Apple, Amazon and Google are joining forces with the Zigbee Alliance to form the Connected Home over IP project to create universal standards for the smart home ecosystem.

The aim of the project is simple; get ahead of the game and reduce the potential for ecosystem fragmentation in the smart home. With Apple, Amazon and Google on board, the working group has access to the worlds’ most popular virtual assistants and can drive towards creating a framework which encourages interoperability and compatibility.

“Our goal is to bring together market-tested technologies to develop a new, open smart home connectivity standard based on Internet Protocol (IP),” Google’s Nik Sathe and Grant Erikson wrote on the company’s blog.

“Google’s use of IP in home products dates back to the launch of Nest Learning Thermostat in 2011. IP also enables end-to-end, private and secure communication among smart devices, mobile apps, and cloud services.”

While it might seem slightly unusual that the internet giants are attempting to collaborate without being forced to, the bigger picture makes it a bit more logical.

The likes of Google, Apple and Amazon are looking to make more money from the software and services elements of the smart home ecosystem. This is an admirable quest, though for money to be made there needs to be mass adoption of smart home products.

As it stands, smart home devices manufacturers are facing a conundrum. Either, spend a lot of money to make sure devices are compatible with all the different smart home ecosystems which are developing, or pick a winner and risk losing out on customers who will exist elsewhere. By creating universal standards for the smart home ecosystem, the manufacturers will theoretically be more encouraging to engage in this emerging segment.

What is always worth remembering is that while the likes of Google and Amazon currently sell smart home devices, there will be a lot more money for these companies on the software side when smart home products are adopted on scale. This is their bread and butter after all, with a plethora of existing relationships already in place. Looking at Apple, this is a company which manufactures premium devices, but has some very aggressive ambitions in the software and services world. This is where CEO Tim Cook envisions growth for the company in the future.

Ultimately this is a good sign for the industry. Collaboration is a word which is thrown around so much nowadays it is almost meaningless, but when it results in universally accepted standards to drive interoperability and compatibility, there is something genuinely exciting to look forward to.