Blog articles from 02/2022

Energy management programs and smart energy solutions can deliver immediate cost benefits to consumers, but the energy industry has generally been unable to find solutions that trigger widespread engagement among their customer base. Utilities have tried different strategies over the years to engage consumers, including a range of energy efficiency (EE) programs that leverage smart thermostats and smart meter data to deliver energy and cost savings. Despite these efforts, a large...

Parks Associates’ Smart Energy Summit is excited to announce Zen Ecosystems as a sponsor of the upcoming event. Zen Ecosystems provides energy management solutions to businesses and consumers. Our Zen HQ platform integrates award-winning smart Zen Thermostats with an intuitive software platform that allows consumers and multi-site businesses to take control of energy costs. With such features as remote user lockouts, HVAC scheduling, smart demand management and lighting...

Parks Associates’ Smart Energy Summit is excited to announce Schneider Electric as a sponsor of the upcoming event. As a global specialist in energy management with operations in more than 100 countries, Schneider Electric offers integrated solutions across multiple market segments, including leadership positions in energy and infrastructure, industrial processes, building automation, and data centers/networks, as well as a broad presence in residential applications....

Parks Associates’ Smart Energy Summit is excited to announce SmartThings as a sponsor of the upcoming event. SmartThings is the premier technology enabling connected living and driving the future of IoT. Its open platform already supports thousands of devices across hundreds of brands and offers endless possibilities to innovators and developers seeking seamless connectivity in a vast IoT ecosystem. The company is committed to bringing simple, trusted smart...

Parks Associates has been tracking the residential security markets since the late 1980s. Security and home systems have been established for decades in specific consumer segments, but now connectivity has created new opportunities. For the security market, market factors are creating new dynamics and a new structure for smart home and home security players: 1. Affordability 2. Commoditization vs. Differentiation 3. Consolidation / Partnerships 4....

Over the last few years, US consumers have shifted their viewing preferences away from traditional providers such as cable and satellite TV toward online sources. According to Parks Associates most recent research: 57% subscribe to a traditional pay-TV service 72% own at least one streaming video product connected to the internet. 29% subscribe directly via an OTT provider’s website, dropping from 41% in a year. 57% subscribe to three or more OTT...

There’s been an ongoing shift by the local news industry towards taking advantage of OTT/streaming opportunities when it comes to distribution and reach. It recently started gaining critical mass in 2020 and particularly during 2021 as streaming became normative and even a necessity for information dissemination. Pay-TV subscribers are much less likely to own and use a TV antenna than non-subscribers. As of Q3 2021, Parks Associates’ consumer survey of 10,000 US internet...

Parks Associates hosted our opening virtual session of the 26th annual CONNECTIONS Conference, featuring discussions around the state of the smart home. It was so great to hear from so many industry leaders about the current state of the market and wanted to share some of Parks Associates research insights from our ongoing research work on the role of partnerships, interoperability, and smart home platforms. For almost 40 years, we have been studying the impact of computing and...