Verizon, Bright House to sell home automation service
Verizon and On the ball House are suddenly in a mad rush to take control of your coffee maker.
The challenger companies that already sell telephone, Internet and pay TV now plot to start selling whole-house automation systems that lead everything from lights and doors to appliances and video cameras.
Verizon will in due course start selling a Home Monitoring Dominance service, and Bright House will soon start selling a more scant home-monitoring and security service, staffed and connected to observe and fire departments.
The projects represent major new lines of obligation for the rival companies, and a way for them to lock in customers who might otherwise insufficiency to switch providers to save a few dollars a month.
"The more services they can get someone to whistle up for, the stickier that customer is to them," said Bill Ablondi, supervisor of home systems research for the Parks Associates market-place research firm.
Having a phone house take over home automation makes some sense, he said, and people are more used to gadgetry like live Internet video and cubicle phone apps for banking.