Last year Somfy began a concerted effort to support the custom installation channel to help them grow their motorization business, and the move is not going unnoticed. Several integrators touted the development of Somfy’s certified and validated drivers for major control platforms like Control4, Crestron, Savant, URC, and Elan.

Also, Somfy’s open API has helped integrators expand their outdoor business into new territory via integrators with companies like St Somfy motors to be the key to integrating unique solutions like smart pergolas from Struxure and its smart pergolas, Phantom Screens and its outdoor motorized insect, shade, privacy and projection screens, and Sunbrella with its motorized awnings.

“Over the last year we’ve been working really closely with integrators to make sure we are filling any gaps that might have existed in the past,” says Brittany Mier y Terán, Partnership and CI Channel Manager at Somfy. She noted how the company has new partnerships with companies such as Alarm.com and Philips Hue to assist integrators (and consumers) with smaller projects.

Jaimey Sapp, vice president at Northern Technology Solutions in Anchorage, Alasksa, says his integration company was almost afraid to jump too deeply into the motorized shading business until it strengthened its relationship with Somfy.

“Since we’ve introduced our shading solutions, I’ve seen a growth of about 4X over the last year and a half,” he notes. “The use of motorization in our automation systems has really complemented the customer’s end-user experience. Using Somfy with our automation installs has also simplified the process and we really enjoy how seamless it works.”

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Eli Weinkle, CEO of NXTAV in Costa Mesa, Calif., says the motorized window treatment category is not only huge for the company, but a category the team enjoys installing. He touted some of the advancements that Somfy has made that enable NXTAV to be able to install motorized window treatments more easily.

“Typically, in a retrofit environment, you’d have to tear the house apart to get the wire to the location. Now, with advancements in battery and two-way wireless communication, you can offer the same level of performance and quality in a product that can be installed with very little disturbance of the property. What we’ve really enjoyed with the new Somfy ZigBee product is the ability to integrate with our primary control platform. Somfy really took an approach that considers the integrator.”