Smart home speakers are expected to add to the US tech industry next year, adding around $1.6 billion. While home automation products will add around $1.7 billion to the US tech industry. Making it a pretty big part of the industry next year. The NPD Group is also saying that the smart home speaker market will grow around 50-percent by 2019. That’s a big jump, but not out of the realm of possibility, and also lines up with what other analysts are expecting for 2019 and beyond.
The NPD Group’s vice president, industry advisor, Stephen Baker stated that “while many new households will explore the smart home experience in the next two years, propelled by the growing ownership of voice-activated speakers, the biggest and best opportunity for retail may remain in encouraging the installed smart home base to make incremental device purchase, and to then provide services to help consumers fully leverage the technology in their smart home.” What Baker is saying here coincides with other reports that have surfaced lately, claiming that the majority of users do not use their “smart” speakers for “smart” tasks. The majority of users use these smart speakers to stream music, or to ask the personal assistant that’s built-in, various questions – like how’s the weather. While companies want customers to use these speakers for controlling their smart home, that’s just not happening yet.
Home Automation and Smart Home products are really starting to rise these days, and that’s due to it being easier to get into the market and get a smart thermostat set up in your home. Or even using the Google Assistant to control the lights in your home. It’s all pretty easy to get started, and prices are also dropping. Which is helping more people to jump into the space and make their home a “smart” home. The $1.7 billion number for home automation in 2019, may actually appear to be a low-ball number, when 2019 actually comes around.