Ikea has a new hub and app that could put an end to smart home usage issues. The new Ikea Executive Center, ready for the subject, is now official after a month of leaks and is expected to arrive along with a completely new Ikea Home Smart app. Unfortunately, both the hub and the new app are not scheduled to arrive until October.
It’s about the same time that Matter, the new smart home standard that promises to make connected devices more interoperable, flexible and private, is supposed to be launched, regardless of whether you bought them from Apple, Google, Amazon, Samsung or any of the long list of companies already registered.
Prior to today’s announcement, Björn Block from Ikea, commercial area manager, and Rebecca Töreman, business leader, showed me the new hub and app working together in a real-time demo. I saw several devices added, or “built-in” in Ikea talk, without any problems. It certainly seemed intuitive and reliable, which are two words that most people would not easily associate with the current Trådfri gateway and the company’s Smart Home app.
Björn Block is in charge of Ikea’s smart home business. Photo of Becca Farsace / The Verge
“With Dirigera and the new app, we’ve focused on strengthening and simplifying the incorporation process when we connect new smart products to the smart home,” says Töreman. “The robustness of the experience is much more reliable, and I think it’s something we’re very proud of,” Block says. “It’s really something that works constantly over and over again.”
Before we dive into what the new hub can do, let’s start with its name: Dirigera. It means “direction” in Swedish. Ikea also calls it “central” to differentiate it from the other white disk-shaped “front door” it is replacing.
Fund
As Ikea says, the old Trådfri catwalk being replaced first debuted in 2014, when Ikea’s smart home ambitions were just a hobby and are still rooted in lighting division. “When we did the [Trådfri gateway]”We only knew about lighting,” says Töreman. “Smart homes were new to us and so were many of our customers.” as regulators and switches were the main means of controlling Ikea smart light bulbs.To add these light bulbs to the Trådfri catwalk, you first had to add your steering device, which was … weird .
Rebecca Töreman is responsible for the Ikea Home Smart product. Photo of Becca Farsace / The Verge
Home Smart became a full-fledged strategic business area in mid-2019 under Block’s leadership, placing it alongside traditional business areas such as the living room, bedroom and textiles in terms of importance to the company. Overnight, Block’s fans were accepted by all of Ikea with a budget that matched their ambitions.
It was the Home Smart business area that developed the new Dirigera hub, with the knowledge that the team has gained over the last eight years. This means that it was built from the ground up to support the entire Ikea Home Smart ecosystem as it exists today, covering lighting, blinds, sound and air purification, as well as which is yet to come. At the end of 2019 I was given a preview of this work. Some have already released firmware versions for the Trådfri Gateway and Home Smart app updates, which have helped to improve the overall user experience. But the body can only do so much if the bones are bad.
Block’s Home Smart team has increased its experience in internal software during the pandemic to match Ikea’s ability to make furniture for “many people.” (The company likes to repeat this phrase despite its questionable syntax, as it is based on the company’s motto: “create a better day to day for many people”).
“It simply came to our notice then. We’ve invested heavily in digital competency, ”says Block,“ hiring in every field, from UX design and software development to data management and data privacy. Coworkers who are digital specialists have a lot to teach our home life experts, and vice versa. “
The best opportunity for Ikea to maintain leadership in life at home
With Ikea Home Smart in order, Block believes that everything is ready to fully adopt Ikea 2.0. “The preconditions for mass adoption are here,” Block says. “So the mission we have to enable smart home for many people, smarter life for many people, democratize smart home, we see that the opportunity is now. It’s a massive enterprise. , of course, but also the best opportunity for Ikea to maintain its leadership in home life. ” Block believes that the trust that Ikea has gained from customers buying their home furniture will extend to sales of their smart home products.
Ikea will continue to make living rooms and kitchens and everything we expect from the company; their products will only be much smarter if Block and Töreman do it with theirs. This means more integrations such as built-in speakers in lights, shelves and wall art; wireless chargers built into desk and table lamps; baked air purifiers on side tables; and anything else that Ikea home-obsessed nerds can dream of.
“I couldn’t even call it a smarter house, or a smarter house, because it’s really just a house,” says Töreman. “It’s the evolution of the home.”
The Matter-ready Dirigera hub
The new center of Dirigera is 2.7 cm high with a diameter of 11.2 cm, which makes it about half as high and a little wider than the old Trådfri walkway which measured 4 .5 cm high and 11 cm wide. The new hub is equipped with an Ethernet port and a USB-C socket for power.
Ikea says at the Matter-ready center as it is not yet officially certified. The first batch of Matter-certified official devices is expected before the end of the year, but it is unclear whether it includes the Lead concentrator or whether its certification will be extended until 2023. When certified, the Lead concentrator and The new Home Smart app supports all existing Home Smart products sold by Ikea, as well as Matter-certified products from other companies. These devices can then be individually controlled or mixed and combined in scenes within the app.
The new Dirigera center is shorter and smarter than the old Trådfri footbridge. Image: Ikea
Inside the Dirigera hub are Wi-Fi, Zigbee, and Thread radios, allowing you to act as a Thread edge router once everything is on. Thread is a primary protocol used by Matter, and a border router is a bridge between a Thread network and a Wi-Fi network, the other protocol used by Matter. After the October release date, the Dirigera hub will be updated with an option to connect to your home internet router via 2.4GHz / 5GHz Wi-Fi, plus a cable Ethernet, which will be the only option on the first day. .
“The material allows us to create a more seamless experience for our customers and will enhance interoperability in smart homes and between smart products,” says Töreman. “For us, that means lowering the thresholds for those looking to set up a smart home or expand their existing one, as we know some customers have questions about what works with what.”
However, Ikea leaves some ambiguity as to which of its many smart products will support Matter natively, declining to provide a list when asked. At this point, he is only committed to making sure that “most of [Ikea’s] The product range is compatible with the subject matter in the future. ” Töreman said Ikea is working to make sure its smart products are “perfectly usable” on a competitor’s platform, but that could also mean Home Smart’s existing integrations with Amazon Alexa , Google Assistant and Apple HomeKit.
Remember that Matter does not yet cover all smart home devices. The current list is plugs, light bulbs, switches, door locks, thermostats, blinds, sensors, garage door controllers, wireless access points and bridges and televisions. This means that Ikea’s low-cost Symfonisk series of speakers with Sonos are not yet part of this discussion. Sonos recently joined the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA) which oversees the matter, which is at least a positive initial sign.
The hub was connected to power and Ethernet along with the revised Home Smart app and shortcut button. Image: Ikea
Ikea also plans to launch remote access away from home during the first half of 2023. Right now, the only way to access your Ikea devices from home is to integrate your Ikea Trådfri catwalk with Apple. Google or Amazon. home networks. Ikea says it will develop its own network in the cloud to manage remote access instead of relying on established networks.
Trådfri gateway owners will not be able to use the new app in October and the gateway will not be updated to support Matter. However, the current gateway and the Home Smart app will continue to be supported and receive security updates and patches for “at least three years,” according to Töreman.
There will also be no upgrade offers; Trådfri owners will have to pay the full price for the Dirigera center when it launches in October, but all your Ikea Home Smart devices …