For the independent security dealer, all of these changing customer and technology profiles is already happening. The appeal of the walled garden’s closed system is convenience and usability; however, that point of distinction is being eroded by those same factors.
Parks Associates recently mapped the smart home’s competitive landscape by looking for cues and harbingers in user reviews. What Parks’ Tom Kerber found was that walled garden automation was already showing signs of dying off.
“The breadth of [open] platforms is much more substantial,” Kerber says. “It will be hard to maintain a [vertically integrated] approach, or even, for that matter, a highly curated approach, when a very open approach can provide a similar user experience and provide much more access…to whatever product you may have or want to own.”
If there’s a key takeaway from the Parks Associates study for your purposes, it is this: The move from vertically integrated to open “could happen relatively quickly,” according to Kerber. “Our recommendation to smart home platform providers, as well as service providers, is to plan for that eventuality.”
This means security dealers may need to consider offering a broader range of products, he adds.
From the article "Residential Security: Beyond the Walled Garden" by Shawn Welsh.
Elizabeth Parks, president of Parks Associates was quoted in USA Today this week as saying: “It’s a challenging time for service providers to make the money work. It makes sense that there will be a l...
Parks Associates has reported that smartwatch adoption has jumped by 35 percent in 2023. While smart technology combines aesthetics and function, there have been some new developments in the medical f...
According to a fresh report from Parks Associates, one in five U.S. households with internet access in the home possess a television antenna. At the same time, 12% of these households do not have a TV...
“It’s a challenging time for service providers to make the money work,” said Elizabeth Parks, president of Parks Associates. “It makes sense that there will be a lot of consolidation in the market. We...
