Apple revealed its full smart home lineup earlier this week, naming companies like LG and Schneider Electric as partners in helping to round out its ecosystem. The company, however, also revealed a secondary aspect of its smart home push: and that’s who’s going to be doing the installations. Roughly a year ago, Apple patented a method to help professional installers not only connect and integrate devices, but also to pass off ownership of the system to the smart homeowner once the installation was complete, and at the time, CE Pro speculated that whether the company might reach out to the CEDIA channel.
Well, that question has been largely answered at this point: it seems ADT will be providing third-party installation services for Apple (though it still doesn’t rule out the possibility that Apple could one day reach out to the CEDIA channel in other ways).
Speculation into ADT’s involvement began earlier this month when MacRumors reported that, since July, Job listings for ADT have appeared across the United States calling for a “Low Voltage Technician.” While some had been hired for the positions, ADT had been quiet about their actual responsibilities, instead, having the new hires shadow ADT installers.
What’s interesting is that this comes as ADT’s exclusivity agreement with Google has just recently expired, meaning the company could be looking to expand its installations partnerships now.
Why integrators should take note
The question remains, though, will Apple choose to operate exclusively through ADT in the consumer market, or might the company seek to reach out to the CEDIA channel, seeing the potential in promoting its solutions to higher-end customers? There’s no question that integrator clients like to include Apple devices in their smart home systems, and we’ve even seen projects that use the old Apple ecosystem to build impressive smart home experience. The question is, is it enough for Apple to see it as a worthwhile opportunity?
Largely consumer-focused brands like SimpliSafe, Aqara and Google have all attempted inroads into the CEDIA channel to further proliferate their products among various clientele, and while some have bowed out, others continue to work with integrators to this day on installations. Once upon a time, it may have been absurd to think that Apple would do such a thing, given how siloed the company tends to be with its products, but now, between the work it has been doing with Matter, the partnerships with LG and Schneider Electric, and now the partnership with ADT, it seems the company might actually be opening up to the idea of a more open ecosystem while also acknowledging the value in using professional installers to ensure a level of quality control with its systems.
