Amazon, Google and Apple collaborate to create open-source smart home standard

The new standard will be designed to work alongside current connectivity protocols, such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi

Google, Apple, and Amazon are to collaborate on an open-source smart-home connectivity standard intended to enable various devices to work together without compatibility issues.

The project, dubbed 'The Connected Home over IP', aims to guarantee that any supported smart home device that users buy will work in their homes, irrespective of which voice assistant or smartphone they are using.

The working group believes such a standard will make it easier for smart home device makers to create devices that will use only one connectivity protocol to be able to work with Siri, Alexa, Google Assistant, and the like.

Google, Amazon, and Apple are currently competing with each other in the smart home space, although that competition has only created problems for the makers and users of smart home products. Makers of smart devices have to use separate communications standards in order to get their devices communicate with different smart assistants - an exercise that is not only time-consuming but expensive too.

As per IDC's latest estimates, the global market for smart home devices is expected to grow 23.5 per cent to nearly 815 million device shipments in 2019, compared to last year. By 2023, those numbers will grow to nearly 1.39 billion devices.

But, in order to make things easier for consumers, companies will need to design some common standard that allows all devices to talk to one another without any issue.

The new standard developed under the Connected Home over IP project aims to achieve that. Moreover, it will be designed to work alongside current connectivity protocols, such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, instead of seeking to replace them.

According to the working group, new devices using the new protocol will likely have to support Bluetooth Low Energy, Wi-Fi, or Thread in order to connect with the smart home system. It will be up to its maker to decide exactly how their device will connect with the system.

The Connected Home over IP project will use technology from Apple, Amazon, Google, Zigbee Alliance, and others, and will be moderated by Zigbee Alliance, the internet of things (IoT) standards consortium.

"We're contributing two of our market-tested and open-source smart home technologies, Weave and Thread. Both are built on IP and have been integrated into millions of homes around the world," Google said in a blog post.

Zigbee Alliance board member companies Samsung SmartThings, KEA, NXP Semiconductors, Legrand, Resideo, Schneider Electric, Silicon Labs, Signify (formerly Philips Lighting), Somfy, and Wulian will also contribute to the project.

The group said it is working to release a draft specification and preliminary open source materials by the end of 2020.

The new standard will be free to use for everyone.