Ring and Lennar Partner to Start New Homes Smart
Ring and homebuilder Lennar have announced the creation of “Lennar Communities Connected by Ring.” New homes built as part of Lennar’s Everything’s Included program will include – standard – the Ring Alarm security system and Ring Video Doorbell Pro, as well as smart locks from Level, routers from eero, leak detection and water monitoring from the Flo by Moen Smart Water Shutoff, Honeywell Resideo thermostats, and the LiftMaster myQ Smart Garage Control. The entire suite of products will be able to be managed through the Ring app, and homeowners can add additional devices as wanted.
The NPD Take:
- Smart home can only succeed if it simplifies our lives – not complicates it, and the ability to manage all of these devices via the one Ring app – if done right – should go a long way to simplifying smart home control. On that note, the installation from Lennar takes away another potential pitfall that DIYers otherwise face.
Google Home May Soon Have More Flexible Controls
Google Home could be getting some new functionality to better enable/restrict access by person to the various smart home devices in the home. Currently, the app does not allow any finetuning – meaning that everyone in the home has access to, and can edit, all devices and settings. New code suggests that soon Google Home will be able to grant different people with different levels of access to different devices.
The NPD Take:
- If and when it comes true, this level of control will be much better than the current all or nothing setting – and it is something that the Nest app already offers. The ability to specify one “manager” or “owner” and parse access to others could prevent mishaps like your children or roommates taking over.
Wink May Finally Be About to Sink
After a 2020 spent forcing its user base into paying a $5 per month subscription, Wink is weathering another storm…suffering a 10-day outage that basically left its hubs useless. As an olive branch, the company extended a 25% discount on current monthly charges, and for the next month, as well – and promised to work to guarantee that nothing of this nature happens again.
The NPD Take:
- A 25% discount off two months of access does little to negate concerns over the long-term stability of the company and reliability of its services – both of which are much more important than a token discount. It is probably time for remaining Wink users to start looking for a new smart home hub solution.