Blog articles from 01/2019

Prior to Parks Associates’ 10th annual Smart Energy Summit , in Austin, Advisory Board member Olaf Lohr, Utility Relations at sonnen, shared his insights on how energy providers can move the energy market forward. How can energy providers move the energy management market forward? Moving the market forward is achieved through a combination of innovation and adoption. Innovations need to be significant, beneficial, easy to install and adopt, and need to provide a significant...

Last week at the Consumer Electronics Show (2019) in Las Vegas, the latest innovations and trends in the automotive market were on showcase. The event featured new product announcements from major players such as Ford, HARMAN, Volkswagen, Audi, and more. Below are five key trends from CES that we expect to influence the market in 2019: Authentication technologies – Parks Associates research shows increasing consumer concerns around companies and hackers stealing their data...

Any time you ask someone about the great things they saw at CES, you need to take their response with a grain (or heaping tablespoon) of salt. The issue is scope. The Consumer Electronics Show is far too big for any one person to get an accurate perspective given all of the keynotes, workshops press events, booths, theaters, and corporate suites to be navigated over a handful of days. For me, I try to sneak away from the suites for a few hours to track down major trends, look into...

The flood of IoT products and services at CES crossed all categories of the smart home space. However, the lineup of smart door lock offerings generated plenty of buzz on its own. According to Parks Associates research, 7% of U.S. broadband households own at least one smart door lock and purchase intentions for these devices hit 21% in Q4 2018. Further, 13% of broadband households in the U.S. are “very likely” (rating of 6-7 on a 7-point scale) to purchase one of these devices over...

On the first workday after CES, there's a lot to reflect on. Many companies have made some big product announcements, and Google has stepped up its game (or at least its marketing) in its ongoing war against Amazon's Alexa. In the TV space, we see a number of interesting trends beginning to emerge. TV Trends from CES 2019 Bigger is better 8K video and artificial intelligence Platform-agnostic digital support Bigger is Better Parks...

Despite flat growth over the past year for virtual reality in both consumer familiarity and ownership , VR technologies remained focal points of many companies at CES® 2019, particularly because the technology has generated much higher interest in consumers outside the U.S. According to Parks Associates’ 360 Deep Dive: Ownership, Use, and Perception of Virtual Reality , roughly one-fourth of U.S. broadband households are familiar with virtual reality headsets, games,...

According to Parks Associates research, 16% of U.S. broadband households share passwords for their online video service accounts . Potential loss of revenue from password sharing adds up to significant sums, as 70% of U.S. broadband households subscribe to an OTT service as of Q3 2018. Synamedia, a technology company specializing in video software, announced a new solution called Credentials Sharing Insight at this year’s CES. The technology relies on AI to help OTT and TV...

Prior to Parks Associates’ 13th-annual CONNECTIONS Summit at CES , in Las Vegas, Geoff Gross, Founder and CEO, Medical Guardian shared his insights on the future of connected devices, smart home, and independent living solutions with the firm's analyst team. Geoff will be participating on the Independent Living: Serving Consumers at Home panel during the conference on Tuesday, January 8, at 4:15 PM. Panelists joining him on this session include: Steve Chazin, VP, Product...