Home Networking: Next Big Thing For Consumer Devices

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

A Parks Associates survey suggests 2009 will center largely on connecting digital cameras, photo frames, and mobile phones.

Consumer electronics purchases will get a new push in the coming months from increased consumer demand for networking among imaging and mobile devices, according to a survey announced Tuesday by Parks Associates.

The new demand, which Parks described as the "next wave of consumer electronics purchasing," will center largely on the home use of digital cameras, photo frames, and mobile phones, the market research firm said, adding that the complete results of the study will be released at the Connection Summit at next month's CES event.

Parks said its survey of U.S. consumers found that nearly 50% of U.S. households with broadband want a digital camera with networking capabilities and nearly 40% would like a networked digital photo frame.

"We're entering a new stage in home networking where interoperability between fixed and portable devices defines new user experiences," Kurt Scherf, VP and principal Parks analyst, said in a statement. "This trend will guide the development of powerful but energy-efficient networking solutions and the design of middleware and user interfaces that can be implemented on multiple devices running a variety of processors and core software."

The Parks study found that consumers see new value in products and services that enable them to transfer mobile calls to fixed line phones and to move music and photos among PCs and portable multimedia players. The market research firm noted that the new surge of interest in networking among portable devices is being driven by a new generation of applications that enable the transfer of media and communications offerings among the devices.

From the article, "Home Networking: Next Big Thing For Consumer Devices" by David Gardner

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