Xiaomi, the world’s third largest smartphone distributor, launches it’s smart home campaign with a $200 million dollar investment.
The company may be relatively unheard of outside of Asia, yet the Beijing based distributor trails behind only Samsung and Apple when it comes to sheer volume of smartphones made. Now they have signaled their interest in the smart home market with an ambitious investment in the appliance making Midea Group.
Chinese manufacturers bet big on smart homes
The Midea Group has been making appliances since 1968, yet it showed its determination to be a major player of the future by spearheading a smart home division in March. Midea’s £1.5 billion smart home strategy made headlines earlier in the year, and now official statements reveal that the appliance maker and the phone giant hope to benefit from each other’s expertise in order to innovate. The figures seem astonishing for a market that is yet to take off on a large scale, but industry leaders are convinced by analysts who value the potential global smart home market in the trillions of dollars and are keen to pull ahead of the competition early.
What does this mean for the European smart home market?
The smart home market is already a crowded one to say the least, and the arrival of another major player will do little to ease the confusion that some consumers are already feeling. The impact of this investment will first be felt in terms of the ‘ecosystem’ that Xiaomi and the Midea Group have already started to establish. Just as Apple has sought to win over developers with the announcement of its HomeKit, and Samsung and Google launched their own consortium with the Thread wireless network, Xiaomi has claimed that it will bring 100 startups into its own ecosystem. To this end, it has already secured iHealth Labs, an innovative startup in the smart health space.
What kind of products can we expect to come out of the Xiaomi Midea deal?
Xiaomi made its millions primarily through a range of well-loved and affordable smartphones, yet since then the company’s products have diversified to include a fitness band and a smart tv, along with an array of other devices. Midea’s original smart home campaign was touted to include water, air, nutrition and health, as well as energy and security systems, so we can expect to see iterations of the smart security devices that have become popular in the States, as well as further developments in the smart health sector. Xiaomi’s existing partnership with iHealth show that the company is able to increase the value of a smart health product with it’s branding, so this seems to be an area where the two companies can expect to make some real progress.
At KAV London, we have a global perspective on the latest developments in the smart home market in order to keep our clients supplied with the very best information. If you would like to learn more about smart home installations in London, or elsewhere, our multilingual team is always ready to chat on 020 7736 1483.