Sound Bars, Smart Speakers, Bluetooth Speakers Driving Home Audio Growth, Says Report

The global home audio market is expected to grow 17 percent this year as smart speakers, sound bars and Bluetooth speakers drive growth in emerging markets, said a Wednesday Futuresource report. Home audio shipments grew 20 percent in 2016, to $11.7 billion, while the overall home electronics market slid 2 percent, Futuresource said. Wireless speakers grew 32 percent in 2016 sales, generating $6.2 billion revenue, and sound bar volume jumped 18 percent to $2.7 billion. Legacy categories took a hit, with sound bars becoming the “default TV-centric audio solution” and wireless speakers replacing legacy audio systems, radios and speaker docks in homes, said analyst Zlata Jelisejeva. Futuresource expects similar cannibalization as voice assistants disrupt the audio hardware market and affect pricing and competition. Amazon’s Echo speaker family commands more than 90 percent of smart speaker sales, and the category is expected to become a “platform battleground” for Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft, said analyst Rasika D’Souza. Voice control will help drive Wi-Fi penetration, benefiting the multiroom feature, which had 10 percent of audio shipments in Q1, D’Souza said. Multiroom capability is forecast to be in 27 percent of home audio devices by 2021. Immersive audio formats, such as Dolby Atmos and DTS:X, will increase from a 5 percent hardware penetration level at the end of last year as content availability improves, said the research firm.