The smart home market is poised for “exceptional growth” of 24% to $178.5 billion by 2025, said Omdia Tuesday. It estimates 19% of broadband households globally had a smart home device in 2020, up from 10% in 2017. “Only a couple of years ago, the smart home market seemed to have reached peak adoption due to complexity, cost and ‘walled gardens’ that discouraged broader market penetration,” said analyst Blake Kozak. Brands are embracing a “purpose-driven approach based on innovation, collaboration, and focus, which has led to the development of new channels such as homebuilders and apartments,” said Kozak. The Matter standard, delayed until mid-2022, “remains the cornerstone for the new smart-home paradigm that will facilitate the dissemination of devices and services to a new customer base.” Smart apartments and single-family homebuilders will have the biggest impact on the smart home category over the next few years in the U.S., where Omdia’s forecast calls for 64.7 million annual device shipments by 2025, a nearly 60% compound annual growth rate. Of the 1.1 million new single-family homes built in the U.S. last year, about 49,000 had smart home features installed during construction, it said; that's expected to grow to 13 million by 2025.

Leviton’s Decora Smart Wi-Fi lighting controls can now integrate with Schlage’s Encode Smart deadbolt, said the companies Tuesday. With Leviton’s My Leviton app, users can trigger lighting activity to coincide with a lock action. User-set scenes could have all or certain lights turn on when the unlock code is entered on the deadbolt's touch screen, they said.

Thirty-six percent of U.S. broadband households own a smart home device, up 2% from Q4, reported Parks Associates Tuesday. “The residential security industry continues to experience a blurring of lines between professional” and do-it-yourself, said President Elizabeth Parks, noting that pro monitoring providers including ADT, Brinks and Comcast have added self-monitoring options, and companies that started with DIY solutions now offer pro monitoring. Parks expects more innovation in AI and video analytics as companies look to add more monthly monitoring subscribers for security and smart home services. Some consumers want to self-monitor even if their home is professionally monitored, said Logan Dunn, Wyze head of growth. They want to see and verify any abnormalities, he said, calling it a trend with “legs.” Smart home camera penetration in the U.S. market is still low, he said, predicting upcoming innovations in the industry will involve video. To grow, the security industry needs to focus on the customer experience and value by making it easier to bring single-point devices into a single smart home ecosystem, said Don Young, ADT chief operating officer. The security experience also needs to extend beyond the home to vehicles and mobile devices to increase the sense of “feeling protected,” Young said. Parks plans a virtual Connections conference on the home security industry Wednesday at 1:30 p.m. EDT.

Smart home services revenue is lagging the pace of sensor device and controller sales, reported ABI Research Thursday. Smart home hardware revenue is expected to grow 20.3% this year from 2020, and set-up fees and subscription services for home installations are forecast at $32 billion, up 3%. “Keen price pressure continues to threaten manufacturers' margins,” said analyst Jonathan Collins. The two-stage growth reflects “a growing divide” within the smart home market as smart home hardware shipment growth outpaces revenue growth by 6% due to price pressure. Service revenue will face “similar price pressure as close to 15 million homes will become smart homes this year, but the value of services sold to those homes declines,” Collins said. The smart home market is at a “key inflection point,” with hardware and service provider players requiring both sides of the market to be healthy, Collins said. Increasingly, the upfront investment to secure long-term revenue is a model that serves only a handful of major players, such as Apple, Amazon, and Google, he said: “With interoperability coming to hardware and system management thanks to the emerging Matter specification, vendors across the smart home space will have to reassess their long-term strategies and engagement.” New services and technologies, such as ultra wideband; low-power, wide-area wireless; and 5G “will all play a part,” along with smart appliances and consumer robotics, Collins said.

Multiple dwelling unit builders see ability to integrate smart home technology with property management software as “very important,” reported Parks Associates Tuesday. Sixty-five percent believe smart home technology differentiates properties and adds value. Increased rental revenue is the most important value here, followed closely by energy efficiency and access control, said analyst Patrice Samuels: “Smart apartments are a valuable amenity to attract and retain renters.”

Johnson Controls will use Silicon Labs' 700 series technology in its 7-inch Qolsys IQ Panel that’s due to launch in the U.S. this summer, the companies emailed Tuesday. Z-Wave interoperability allows the IQ Panels, which work on the Alarm.com platform, to work across multiple wireless brands, it said. Consumers can access Z-Wave diagnostics and receive remote diagnostic support from Alarm.com; they can see their mesh network on screen, capture Z-Wave SmartStart QR Codes with the built-in camera and troubleshoot Z-Wave smart home devices from remote locations, said Johnson Controls Vice President-Sales and Marketing Mike Hackett.

Revenue in the global smart appliances market is projected to expand to $76.4 billion by 2026, from $33.8 billion this year, reported MarketsandMarkets Friday. Rising energy prices, changing consumer lifestyles and increasing use of wireless connectivity will be top growth drivers, it said: COVID-19 cut the market's growth rate in 2020 and 2021.

Smart home company Orro announced an integration with Sonos under the Works with Sonos program. Customers can use the display on Orro smart light switches to control audio content on their Sonos speakers including adjusting volume and skipping tracks, it said Wednesday. To set up the integration, Orro professional installers and customers select Sonos from the Integrations section of the Orro app. The device then searches for the Sonos system and “within seconds,” all connected Sonos products in the home are hooked up and controllable by Orro, it said.

The smart plug market is forecast to expand at a 30% compound annual growth rate to $13.99 billion by 2024 driven by demand for remote access to appliances, reported Technavio Thursday. A third of the growth will originate from North America, it said. Top players in the “fragmented” market include Belkin, D-Link, Edimax, Insteon, iSmart Alarm, Leviton, Panasonic, SDI Technologies and TP-Link, it said.

The evolving smart home market is facing “another ignition” point, with consumers looking for full-scale systems, blogged Mark Burson, Nice vice president-marketing, who will speak at Parks Associates’ virtual Connections conference Tuesday on professional installation opportunities in smart home. Min Kang, Brinks Home chief strategy and product officer, said some smart devices can be installed by do-it-yourselfers, but “professional installation is an important piece of the puzzle” for more complex installations. The session will be at 3 p.m. EDT.