CTIA announced a voluntary, common industry standard for evaluating pre-owned wireless devices, established by its Reverse Logistics and Service Quality Working Group. “This collaboration by America’s wireless industry will make the grading of wireless devices more straightforward and consistent,” said Tom Sawanobori, CTIA chief technology officer, Monday. “The standard will help create uniformity.”
Industry shipped nearly 105 million units of wearables globally in 2018, a 10 percent increase from 2017kiiiiilo, reported Futuresource Consulting Monday. Average selling prices are rising at a faster rate than unit growth on increasing demand for upscale smartwatches and the “parallel stagnation” of lower-priced activity trackers and sports watches, it said. Google’s recent $40 million buy of Fossil’s smartwatch patents (see 1901170054) leaves "the market anticipating a hardware release from Google or potential revamp of its Wear OS platform,” said Futuresource. It expects wearables shipments to exceed 145 million worldwide in 2022, driven "predominantly by replacement sales and the ongoing uptake of smartwatches and wireless watches.”
The deadline for filing a claim in Vizio’s $17 million class-action settlement (see 1810050040) is April 29, said a Friday letter from the plaintiffs’ lawyers Cotchett Pitre. Consumers who bought a Vizio smart TV and connected it to the internet Feb. 1, 2014-Feb. 6, 2017, can file a claim as part of the settlement for the case, which alleges Vizio violated privacy laws and consumer-protection laws by collecting sensitive information about what was displayed on certain Vizio TVs and selling the data to advertisers “without sufficient disclosures.” Estimated compensation is $13 to $31 per TV, depending on the number of eligible claims submitted, they said. Vizio denied the allegations. The settlement hearing date is May 29. The company will delete all viewing data it collected during the class period, said the settlement notice.
Ludenso announced availability of an augmented reality headset for Android and iOS smartphones. MagiMask works with full-screen apps for AR titles, movies and games and is said to have resolution four times higher than split-screen VR headsets. Its single-lens approach lets users view the full size of a smartphone screen, compensating for stereoscopic effect and convergence and delivering better resolution than stereoscopic head-mounted displays. It comes with a universal phone mount. The crowd-funded MagiMask has begun shipping to backers and is available to others for $99.
Thirty-five percent of U.S. broadband households with home or renter's insurance are interested in proactive communication of potential risk situations in a connected home, blogged Parks Associates Thursday. A service that repairs damage is the most appealing, but interest is “strong” in proactive services enabled by smart home devices and artificial intelligence capabilities to detect and prevent risk situations, said analyst Brad Russell. Changes in trends in consumer expectations, combined with the data derived from IoT solutions, are opening market opportunities for the insurance industry, it said.
Best Buy pushed online ordering interactions via Alexa in a Thursday email to customers. Though the email referenced Alexa only, the “learn how” link took customers to a page with both Alexa and Google Home instructions for communicating with the retailer's e-commerce site from a smart speaker. It differentiated instructions for the two, saying Google Assistant uses “actions” to find information and Alexa uses “skills.” It instructed users to click “explore” on the Assistant app to search for the Best Buy action. An optional second step is to complete the linking process in the app by signing into your Best Buy account, required for order tracking. The third step is to say, “Hey, Google. Talk to Best Buy.” It gave examples of commands to “buy headphones from Best Buy,” ask for store hours; ask about Total Tech Support; and request order status. For Alexa users, in addition to asking about order tracking and Total Tech support, it said to ask Alexa about voice-only deals and to research products. We communicated with both Google Assistant and Alexa. Cadences remain a problem, we found. Sony noise-canceling headphones in black came across as “Sony black-noise canceling headphones” in Google Assistant-speak. We had to get the trigger phrase just right. We asked Alexa, “What are the Best Buy deals?” and she responded: “It looks like Amazon doesn’t sell Best Buy.” When we said, “ask Best Buy about voice-only deals,” she gave four offers. Google, too, required perfect syntax. Alexa gave us a mishmash of four product deals: a Garmin smartwatch ($199), a PhunkeeDuck self-balancing scooter ($299), a two-pack of Aluratek Bluetooth speakers ($20) and an Insignia NS-CAHBTEBNC-S noise-canceling headphone for $35. Alexa appeared to try to pronounce the headphones’ model number as a word, requiring yet another trip to the website: most pronunciations weren’t clear enough for us to understand what we were being offered.
IntoPIX introduced a codec that allows Crestron DM NVX AV-over-IP products to deliver high-quality video and still images over a standard 1 Gbps network, it said Wednesday. The company promises “flawless link quality” from source to display without requiring high bandwidth and said the codec supports resolutions up to 8K.
While 28 percent of U.S. broadband households are familiar with time-of-use rate programs, only 18 percent report their utility offers one, said Parks Associates Wednesday. Of those who have been offered a TOU plan, 38 percent signed up, said analyst Brad Russell. Familiarity with these programs hasn’t budged much since 2015, Russell said, but smart home devices such as smart thermostats could open a new line of communication with consumers to boost familiarity and convey benefits. They could also help reduce consumers' fears of loss of control, the top inhibitor to TOU enrollment, said the analyst.
Amazon Echo has 70 percent of the U.S. installed base of smart speakers, followed by Google Home with 24 percent and Apple HomePod at 6 percent, reported Consumer Intelligence Research Partners Tuesday. The U.S. installed base of smart speaker devices is 66 million units, up from 53 million at the end of September and 36 million in Q4 2017, it said. Holiday shoppers “helped the smart speaker market take off again,” said analyst Josh Lowitz. Market share has remained consistent among the top three players, even as Amazon and Google broaden product lines. Apple’s share will remain limited “until it offers an entry-level product closer to Echo Dot and Home mini,” Lowitz said. Smart speaker owners continue to add to their speaker families, with 35 percent of all owners having more than one device at the end of December vs. 18 percent a year earlier, it said. Google has caught up to Amazon in convincing owners to use smart speakers in multiple rooms, said analyst Mike Levin. A year ago, almost twice as many Echo users as Google owners had multiple units; now, a third of each platform’s users have more than one. Findings were based on a survey of 500 owners of Amazon Echo, Google Home, and Apple HomePod speakers Jan.1-11. Parks Associates said Tuesday that 97 percent of smart speaker households own only one brand, with two-thirds owning an Echo device and roughly a third owning Google Home. The trend of brand loyalty in the early market creates opportunities for device makers to upsell premium products, it said. Consumers who spent over $1,000 in the past 12 months on CE products -- and plan to buy products over the next year -- list smart speakers among their intended buys, along with laptops, TVs, streaming media players and sound bars, said Parks. "Smart speaker owners are increasingly adopting multiple devices in various rooms of the household, said analyst Kristen Hanich, and device makers can “leverage this tendency toward repeat and extra purchases to bundle new and premium products with smart speaker sales."
AudioControl announced an Imax Enhanced firmware update for the Concert AVR-7 and AVR-9 receivers and the Maestro M5 and M9 preamp/processors to experience Imax’s sound mix, delivered by DTS. The update becomes available Tuesday, and customers can download it from the AudioControl website.