This has been going on in home automation for about 40 years now. The problem is that the end devices (bulbs, switches, thermostats, etc) are low margin. The controller hubs are high margin. So companies keep building controller hubs to connect with everyone else's low margin end items. These companies just want to make the high margin hubs and have nothing to do with the end devices. Of course the makers of the end devices make hubs too and they don't like losing the businesses. So the same solution occurs over and over -- the end devices employ encryption (or secret protocols) to keep the hub only companies out.
And we're setting up for this cycle again in spades with Apple HomeKit. You'd have to be an idiot of a device vendor to sign up for it. Not only does Apple control the hub, you also have to pay them 7% of your revenues to connect to it and buy a custom encryption chip from Apple to put into your product. This is going to make HomeKit devices twice the price of the competition and no one will buy them.
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Date: 2015-09-21 01:27 am (UTC)And we're setting up for this cycle again in spades with Apple HomeKit. You'd have to be an idiot of a device vendor to sign up for it. Not only does Apple control the hub, you also have to pay them 7% of your revenues to connect to it and buy a custom encryption chip from Apple to put into your product. This is going to make HomeKit devices twice the price of the competition and no one will buy them.