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STAMFORD, Conn., August 6, 2015

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Gartner Says Competition Is Increasing to Be the IoT Gateway

to the Connected Home
ISPs Will Be the Early Winners in the Battle for the IoT Home Gateway

The hype surrounding the Internet of Things (IoT) in the home is growing rapidly, according to Gartner, Inc., as
the battle for the IoT gateway in the connected home gets underway.
"The numerous IoT applications for the home include smart stoves, which tell you how to cook a meal and
provide recipes; and smart washers and dryers, which help you determine the optimum time to run a load of
laundry," said Paul O'Donovan, principal research analyst at Gartner. "Add to that smart lighting, which can be
operated remotely and programed to dim or turn on or off at specific times; thermostats, which can have your
living space at the desired temperature when you walk in the door; and entertainment devices, which can
stream programming to your display whenever you want to watch it."
As home appliances have increased in smartness, cellular and cable connections improved, and pricing
declined, the desire or ability to monitor and control the home as a holistic platform of devices and appliances
has emerged.

"Many IoT applications are triggered by sensors and need data management, but there is no single IoT gateway
to the home," said Mr. O'Donovan. "As Internet-connected homes become increasingly smarter, the gateway is
becoming the "center" for connecting the different devices and home appliances to make the management of
the ecosystem happen."
The home IoT gateway market is expanding rapidly. The number of smart connected homes is expected to
grow from between 100 million and 200 million homes now to between 500 million and 700 million homes by
2020.

The lack of a good business model or the immaturity of home IoT products has not stopped gateway makers
from trying to develop the market to grab share in the home IoT opportunity. Cable companies, Internet
companies, alarm companies and mobile phone operating system providers are actively creating platforms and
ecosystems in an attempt to break into the market.
Gartner predicts that the most successful home gateway provider will develop a system that seamlessly
integrates with nearly any vendor's IoT application and is relatively painless to the homeowner. A system that
locks homeowners into one specific operating system limits their opportunity, as consumers will want to
exercise their preference in terms of the IoT products they choose.

Multiple home platforms have emerged, designed to capitalize on or create an ecosystem of smart home things
that the gateway must connect to. Some of the platforms are beginning to open up, or at least work with the
others to minimize the different number of platforms that the consumer and the gateway must deal with. Some
smart home solutions are even taking advantage of this void and creating hubs that act as a central command
system for the smart home devices, using multiple communication protocols to connect to all of the smart
devices in the home and communicate to the world through the IoT gateway.
"As the IoT gateway market emerges, ISPs will be the early winners in the battle for the home gateway,
provided they develop solutions or partner with hub manufacturers. The mobile phone providers will gain a
smaller part of this market, but ultimately the cellular model will not have enough bandwidth to compete with
the ISP solution. Longer term, there will need to be an integrated device, whereby the gateway is also the hub,
or integrated hub and gateway solutions will be needed," said Mr. ODonovan.
More detailed analysis is available in the Gartner report "Market Trends: The Battle for the IoT Gateway in the
Connected Home."
IoT trends will be discussed at Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2015, October 4-8 in Orlando, Florida. More
information on the event is available at www.gartner.com/us/symposium. Members of the media can register
for the event by contacting Christy Pettey at christy.pettey@gartner.com.
About Gartner Symposium/ITxpo

Gartner Symposium/ITxpo is the world's most important gathering of CIOs and other senior IT executives. This
event delivers independent and objective content with the authority of the world's leading IT research and
advisory organization, and provides access to the latest solutions from key technology providers. Gartner's
annual Symposium/ITxpo events are key components of attendees' annual planning efforts. IT executives rely
on these events to gain insight into how their organizations can use IT to overcome business challenges and
improve operational efficiency.
Additional information from the event will be shared on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Gartner_inc and using
#GartnerSYM.
Upcoming dates and locations for Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2015 include:
September 28-30, Cape Town, South Africa
October 4-8, Orlando, Florida

October 19-22, Sao Paulo, Brazil

October 26-29, Gold Coast, Australia

October 28-30, Tokyo, Japan
November 2-5, Goa, India

November 8-12, Barcelona, Spain

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Contacts

Janessa Rivera
Gartner
janessa.rivera@gartner.com

Rob van der Meulen

Gartner
rob.vandermeulen@gartner.com

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