Consumer Adoption of Smart Home Monitoring Services 'Fairly Limited,' Says Report

Smart home companies have begun a shift from hardware to service-driven business models, but adoption has been “fairly limited,” said a Wednesday Navigant Research report. Services such as security monitoring, health and independent living, energy savings, HVAC performance monitoring and convenience have come to market, but while adoption of connected devices has grown dramatically, “consumers have not been convinced of the value in paying monthly fees for many of the home services available,” said the report. Services can give companies a way to generate recurring revenue to capitalize on their IoT investment -- while creating “stickier” relationships with consumers -- but getting consumers to adopt services “is proving challenging,” said analyst Neil Strother. Smart home providers need to determine a strategy for diversifying revenue streams and monetizing consumer data to overcome the challenge, “or this could become a missed opportunity.”