Digital Lifescapes

A reduction in office occupancy and lease terminations, due to the growth of remote work, has had an inverse effect on consumer spending. As an example, despite the economic issues in some markets, spending on smart home devices grew in 2022. According to the latest market study by ABI Research, by the end of the year, smart home hardware revenues  -- including devices, hubs, and controllers -- will surpass $30 billion worldwide, that's up by 15 percent over 2021. Smart Home Market Development According to the ABI assessment, driving investments in the face of a sharper economic reality is a growing expectation among consumers for smart home capabilities that deliver greater value. "The COVID pandemic-induced emphasis on home improvement boosted the Smart Home industry," said Jonathan Collins, research director at ABI Research . The Work-from-Home phenomenon moved into a more mainstream awareness that continues to bolster spending as consumers look to replace or improve d...

High-speed internet access from home is essential to participate in the Global Networked Economy. The worldwide residential broadband service market reached a subscriber base of over 1.1 billion users in 2020 -- that's a 4 percent increase from the previous year. Clearly, the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated demand for broadband connectivity. The need for high-capacity residential broadband will remain, even post-pandemic. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) will be the fastest-growing residential broadband segment to increase at a CAGR of 71 percent, exceeding 58 million subscribers in 2026. Remote working, online learning, and virtual healthcare created new demand for high-speed broadband throughout 2020. The significant increase in the use of internet-based entertainment services also prompted broadband users to upgrade, while more households without broadband access subscribed for the first time. Residential Broadband Serv...

The Work from Home (WFH) phenomena has fueled the need for more devices, better internet access, and secure networking technologies. Plus, the COVID-19 pandemic is now driving demand for Wi-Fi customer premise equipment (CPE) as millions of people work and learn from their homes. According to the latest global market study by ABI Research, the closely related worldwide Wi-Fi CPE market will see vendors ship more than 223 million units in 2020 -- that's a surge of 10 million units from 2019 reported growth. "Stay-at-home orders imposed in the first quarter of 2020 forced millions of consumers to work from home and students to do home-based learning, creating the need for ultra-reliable broadband and Wi-Fi connectivity in households worldwide," said Khin Sandi Lynn, an analyst at ABI Research . Wi-Fi CPE Market Development There has been a sudden spike in the adoption of Wi-Fi routers and wireless network extenders as consumers seek a reliable Wi-Fi connection that can simu...

Looking across the Internet of Things (IoT) overall security landscape, it's clear that 'consumer IoT' should be viewed as a separate segment, given that current trends in the implementation and adoption of robust security measures. The consumer market is composed of a very wide range of hardware vendors -- from large companies to crowdfunded start-ups. Competition in the market is high, but the IoT security value proposition is much more difficult to present to the end-user, relative to other IoT segments. For context, note that the overall number of connected IoT devices, sensors and actuators in all market segments are forecast to reach over 46 billion in 2021. Consumer IoT Security Market Development The consumer IoT installed base will reach over 15 billion units by 2021, an increase of 120 percent over 2016, according to the latest worldwide market study by Juniper Research. As evidenced at the CES show earlier this month, embedded connectivity is increas...

Ever since the mainstream adoption of the mobile smartphone, the word 'smart' is used broadly to define any device that has some form of on-board communication connectivity. Likewise, a Smart Home is designed to deliver a number of digital services inside and outside the home, through a range of networked devices. Juniper Research believes the entertainment segment to be the most viable in terms of consumer uptake, for the simple reason that these services are almost universally desired. Revenues from smart home hardware and services will reach $83 billion this year, rising to $195 billion by 2021, according to the latest market study by Juniper Research. This revenue upside will be generated through entertainment, automation, healthcare and connected devices. Smart Home Market Development The new research also found that home automation and smart appliances will be the two fastest growing segments over the next 5 years, driven by established manufacturers such as Sa...

Many more consumer electronics devices will become part of the typical home network, as the Internet of Things (IoT) phenomena gains momentum. Meanwhile, the desire to create intuitive home spaces continues to increase, which in turn creates opportunities for more vendors to gain a share of the smart home market. Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of smart home product owners used a smartphone to control or monitor their home automation devices, according to the latest market study findings by The NPD Group. Additionally, 73 percent of smart home owners already use voice commands, with 61 percent of those consumers expressing an interest in wanting to use voice to control more products in their homes. Smartphone App Software Integration "This reliance on smartphones to control and monitor the smart home is due, in part, to app compatibility, as nearly all home automation devices have an iPhone or Android app,” said John Buffone, executive director at The NPD Group . NPD beli...

Although the fundamental ideas of applied automation in a residential setting were conceived long ago, progress to a technology-rich 'smart' home have remained somewhat elusive. Nonetheless, market development should improve as vendors utilize more effective product adoption strategies. By definition, a Smart Home is one that is designed to deliver or distribute a number of digital services within and outside the home environment, through a range of networked devices. According to the latest worldwide market study by Juniper Research, consumer spend on Smart Home services -- including entertainment, health, energy and home automation -- will reach $100 billion by 2020. That's well over twice the estimated spend for 2015, at $43 billion. Entertainment services, such as Netflix and Spotify, are playing a key role in boosting the Smart Home market size -- driven by a universal appeal, and the relatively low cost of these services. However, emerging Smart Home segments,...

If you're one of those American consumers that learned how to configure your Wi-Fi router to add various new devices to your wireless home network, then consider yourself one of the many who are self-sufficient techies. Parks Associates reports that, based on the findings from their recent market study, 84 percent of U.S. broadband households set-up their entertainment and computing devices on their own, while 60 percent set-up their smart home devices on their own. The Parks study found that despite this independent on-boarding process, the need for vendor technical support persists and will increase as consumers bring more connected devices into the home. "Consumers’ home networks are rapidly expanding through the adoption of complex connected devices," said Patrice Samuels, research analyst at Parks Associates . Tech support is a key factor in tying together the Internet of Things (IoT), according to Parks Associates. For example, 27 percent of U.S. broadband ...

The growing applications for Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) solutions are already benefiting from the adoption of new broadband technologies. The worldwide Wi-Fi customer premises equipment (CPE) market is expected to grow 11 percent in 2014. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, total shipments of Wi-Fi access points, routers, and residential gateways are set to surpass 176 million units by the end of 2014. "Growth is expected in all regions, driven by increased broadband penetration and more connected devices in homes," said Jake Saunders, VP and practice director at ABI Research . Since its WLAN market inception in 2013, shipments of the 802.11ac standard have accelerated. In the consumer Wi-Fi equipment market, D-Link and NETGEAR lead 802.11ac access point shipments. The combined shipments of the two companies represented more than 20 percent of worldwide 802.11ac shipments in 1Q 2014. ABI Research expects that nearly 32 million 802...

There's no doubt, 4G LTE has turbocharged the Mobile Internet experience, which has reflected in rapid adoption of new smartphones along with other mobile devices. Besides, it has also reinvigorated the broadband wireless marketplace. According to the latest market study by ABI Research, 1.26 billion households do not have DSL, cable, or fiber-optic broadband. Fixed and mobile service providers are looking to LTE to make the connection. "By the end of 2014, we anticipate there will be 14.5 million residential and commercial premises with fixed LTE broadband access. By 2019, that figure should grow to 123 million," said Jake Saunders, VP and 4G practice director at ABI Research . Chipset and CPE technology vendors are stepping up efforts to prime the market by manufacturing lower cost devices for both the consumer and enterprise mobility segments. Chinese vendors -- such as Huawei and ZTE -- along with American brands such as NETGEAR and Novatel Wireless have partn...

The notion of a Smart Home -- where technology is a central part of enabling new digital lifestyle advances -- has been discussed for more than a decade. It appears that the concept is finally gaining traction in 2014, even within Europe. According to the latest market study by Strategy Analytics, 11 percent of UK households will have at least one smart system by the end of this year, rising to over 27 percent of households in five years. The number of UK households with some form of smart home system -- automated entertainment, energy, appliance, security or healthcare systems typically controlled remotely through internet technology -- will increase 43 percent on last year to 3.1 million in 2014, spending a total of £715 million. This is forecast to double to £1.4 billion across 7.7 million UK households by 2019. "While telecom brands are leading the drive in Europe, energy companies are dominating the early take-up of smart homes in Britain," said Bill Ablondi, dir...

Wi-Fi adoption within the home is now pervasive, but application usage can vary. According to the latest market study by The Diffusion Group (TDG), 74 percent of Millennials that use a home network describe their use as either 'equally' or 'primarily' media-oriented, a rate that decreases linearly with increasing age. TDG’s detailed market assessment notes that this is coincidental with the fact that young adults consume greater amounts of digital media in the home from online video sources such as Netflix -- certainly more so than their older counterparts. While the percentage of digital media-oriented network users is relatively equal among the two Millennial segments, differences do exist. For example, among Late Millennials (18-24s), 24 percent are media-centric network users, significantly higher than Early Millennials (25-34s) at 15 percent. However, hybrid use (that is, equal use of the network for media and data purposes) was selected by 58 percent of Ea...

While the concept of an automated home was conceived many years ago, various technical limitations have, until recently, meant that a truly connected home was but a dream for the average consumer. With the advent of mass-deployed broadband Internet access and the development of wireless technology, smart connected devices in the home are now a very real possibility. Juniper Research forecasts that the installed base of connected appliances in Smart Homes will exceed the 10 million mark by 2017 -- that's rising from 4 million units in 2013. Their latest global market study found that consumer awareness of connected appliances -- such as smart refrigerators and washing machines -- was gradually increasing, but that such devices are not widely considered to offer attractive value-added benefits. The Internet of Things for an Intelligent Home According to the Juniper assessment, smart appliances remain a niche item, given their high retail prices, poor use cases and ongoing se...

The adoption of more internet-connected devices within the home -- such as media tablets and smart TVs -- creates rapidly increasing broadband connectivity demand. As a result, worldwide home network penetration is expected to climb from 24.8 percent in 2013 to 33.2 percent by 2018, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. In particular, growth of home networking applications is driven by the continued spread of broadband services and demand for multi-screen video services. What is seen as commonplace in mature markets, including server provided broadband routers with integrated Wi-Fi access points and leveraging fixed broadband connections to offload expensive mobile data packages while consuming large amounts of content, is slower to move to emerging markets. In some cases, this is driven primarily by low service ARPU while in others it is simply limited fixed broadband infrastructure. "Wi-Fi remains the most important networking technology, but despite an e...

Professionals working remotely are accepted at most forward-thinking companies today, as more progressive executives direct their recruiters to search out and hire the best talent for the role -- regardless of where they reside. Business is now run at the speed of information exchange, facilitated by online communications and real-time audio and video collaboration. In 10 years, however, the average work environment will likely be foreign to most people, according to the latest market study by Frost & Sullivan. Their latest research features results from a Connected Home survey of more than 1,700 respondents, finding about 30 percent of individuals indicate they already work from home, at least part of the time. The market analysis highlights the transformational technologies that are being introduced into the workplace. The research studied how business can depend less on a formalized structure, and more on a virtualized, idea-driven structure to leverage intellectual proper...

It's estimated that there are 425 million devices connected to the Internet in U.S. homes, according to the latest market study by The NPD Group. They found that while personal computers are still the primary connected device, numerous others are diminishing the PC’s relevance to the broadband content marketplace. This trend is being fueled by devices such as gaming consoles and blu-ray disc players adding to the number of Internet connected HDTVs -- and direct IP connectivity to a Smart TV set. Strong consumer retail sales in developing categories -- such as tablets and smartphones -- are also impacting the traditional PC’s share of Internet connected devices. By the end of 2013, a shift towards more screen-sharing across devices is expected. Smaller screens such as the smartphone have the greatest reach now with an estimated 133 million users -- with tablets contributing another 31.8 million screens. The development of the shared screen experience, by diverting conte...

The global market for home automation services grew significantly during 2012, primarily driven by a wave of new entrants and offerings in the North American market. According to the latest market study by ABI Research, the U.S. in particular leads in deployments and new shipments -- acting as a bellwether for markets around the world. Even within the low growth American economy and the lackluster new housing market, home automation systems installed in the U.S. this year almost doubled over 2011 shipments. In 2017, more than 8 million home automation systems will ship -- representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 45.2 percent between 2011 and 2017. Over the past 12 months, Verizon has rolled out its service offering, leading U.S. cable companies -- including Comcast and Time Warner -- have expanded their footprints and security vendors including ADT and Vivint continued to see strong demand for their solutions. "Home automation adoption is moving into the main...

According to the latest market study by Infonetics Research, the increased adoption of connected consumer electronics devices -- and various other Internet-enabled devices within the home -- creates exponential demand for high-speed local area networks. "Media tablets, connected TVs, digital media players, and a growing list of other devices are driving sales of home networking devices, and this is nowhere more apparent than in North America, which captured 37 percent of networking device revenue in 2011," notes Jeff Heynen, directing analyst for broadband access and video at Infonetics Research . Infonetics has forecast that the demand for broadband peripherals -- especially those with integrated MoCA chips -- will continue to increase globally as broadband service providers in all regions launch new home automation, energy management, entertainment, and communications services that require high-end networking devices. I anticipate that the upside for new high-speed...

Wireless high-definition (HD) video technologies are the next frontier in consumer electronic (CE) connectivity, streaming uncompressed 1080p high-definition video across the living room. The category is comprised of three technologies: wireless home digital interface (WHDI), Wireless HD, and Wireless Gigabit (WiGig). Earliest applications for wireless HD video technologies were centered around the CE cluster and were used primarily as HDMI cable replacement. Today it has evolved into the PC cluster connecting mobile PCs to DTVs. Significant future use will likely be for connecting mobile devices to digital televisions (DTVs). According to the latest market study by NPD In-Stat , they now forecast that nearly 23 million wireless HD video-enabled devices will ship in 2015. “While all three technologies will see some type of market adoption over the forecast period, WiGig is likely to be the most popular wireless HD video technology,” says Brian O’Rourke, Research Director at NPD...

Like the closely-related market for home energy management systems (HEMS), the smart appliances market has failed to develop as many in the industry had anticipated. Most internet connected appliance product applications are still in the early pilot project stage and have failed to reach retail outlets in any large number. However, according to the latest market study by ABI Research, shipments will soon begin to accelerate and eventually exceed 24 million units by 2017. With smart meter deployment growing apace, energy costs following a seemingly upward trajectory, and progress made on improving interoperability of all aspects of the smart grid, it is only a matter of time before shipments gather momentum. That being said, it is likely that it will take a couple of years for ultra-premium price tags to erode, and for dynamic pricing structures to become more widely implemented in order to stimulate consumer demand. The number of major appliance manufacturers that have used r...