While the local wireless communication in the house is already solved since many years (see above), the internet connection leaves some challenges. Device manufacturers lack the expertise to solve the connectivity puzzle.

Core Requirements of a Connected Product

It all starts with the choice of the wireless chip, studying the networking protocols, defining a hardware design, programming the processor, solve security and approval issues . Then the servers have to be setup, software has to be released and managed, network firmware defined and finally everything prepared for the end user. This is a 1 to 2 or even more years exercise. Time-to-market today in consumer electronic of more than 1 year is suicide.

The hardware manufacturers have a lack of the necessary domain expertise and fear the challenge to work with prototype or experimental solutions. But this approach is also in high cost and need of resources. Hardware manufacturers have to invest largely and prepare themselves for ongoing operational support. Iterations on solutions are difficult because of the development cycles and so the best consumer value gets lost. Last but not least security and privacy is hard to identify for hardware manufacturers. Especially with the cultural and political differences between Europe, where the technology shall be used, and Asia, where it is manufactured, are big in these terms. But even in Europe it will be difficult to identify the tipping point between usefulness and invasiveness.