Although the term “Home Automation” has been around since 1984 when the American Association of House Builders started using it to refer to the bright future of the housing industry, it took three decades for people to realise that home automation is going to be the next big thing – a multi-billion industry that opens up so many opportunities for both existing electrical suppliers and startups who are looking to develop smart appliances for consumer or business sectors
Glow Green, a digital-first boiler installer based in Bournemouth, UK has created an infographic to visualise stats and facts about home automation and the direction that this exciting industry is heading to.
The main take-away from this research is that the industry has grown into a powerful entity without anybody really noticing, however, it will take time to convince the consumers to open their wallets. Although 66 per cent of people have heard about home automation and think it is a reasonably good idea, 28 per cent of Brits do not plan to equip their homes with smart gadgets in the foreseeable future.
Nevertheless, the current volume of home automation sales is probably enough to convince the doubters who are unsure whether to shift their product development towards automation or to stay true to their present-day offering.
According to the last accurate revenue figures from 2014, the smart home industry was worth $20 billion. Today, its global market is worth at least $40 billion and set to reach $59 billion by 2020.
The current sales figures are more than encouraging. Looking at just the voice-enabled speakers sector, 11 million Amazon Echo/Dot devices and 3.7 million Google Home devices have been sold to date. To put it in monetary terms, just during the 4 quarter of 2016 in the run-up to Christmas, Amazon raked in close to a billion dollars in revenue just on the back of their voice-enabled speaker range.
Other sectors that are powering the home automation industry are home appliances and heating industry. It is estimated that one in 5 vacuums sold to the consumer market are robotic. The most successful brand of robotic vacs – iRobot – have sold more than 15 million units worldwide.
The heating industry is geared up equally well with 11 million smart air cons and 2.5 million NEST smart thermostats sold. There is a very good case for smart thermostats paired with highly-efficient modern gas boilers. They can help save around 12 per cent off an average annual gas bill, which is a good value proposition.
More exciting products are introduced to the market every day. At the latest count there were 51 different smart plugs and 32 smart light bulbs brands actively marketed, and experts estimate that by 2020 there would be at least 100 million smart light bulbs in use.
The uptake of home automation systems is lead by millennials, which is an important fact for the marketing teams as it changes the way they need to think about positioning the new products. Historically, it was the more mature people who made buying decisions when it came to choosing home appliances. Today, the marketing message needs to change to include younger people. Although most millennials are completely sold on the idea, according to research one in four millennials don’t plan to buy a voice-enabled speaker in the nearest future. It will be up to the R&D teams to make sure they tweak the product experience to match the expectations of their younger audience and the marketing teams to deliver campaigns that aim to address the needs and expectations of the consumers who are looking forward to living in a connected world.
