Blog articles from 11/2020

The residential security industry must adapt to challenges brought by COVID-19. The pandemic inhibits in-home installation, places financial pressure on some customers, and requires new precautions and procedures for company employees. COVID-19 has increased online transactions for self-installable systems and devices due to social distancing practices, resulting in heightened demand for remote technical support. Parks Associates 2020 Security Dealer Survey finds that a majority of...

The COVID-19 crisis and months of shelter-in-place/lockdown orders have changed operations for all businesses, especially small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), which have had to adjust to reduced budgets and broad-scale shifts to work from home. The move to a remote workforce means deploying new software, like voice and video conferencing, to keep employees working at home productively. In fact, video conferencing services are now more common among SMBs than landline telephone...

Parks Associates' upcoming Future of Video: OTT, Pay TV, and Digital Media conference on December 14-16 brings together industry leaders to share insights on new trends in the video and connected entertainment industries. Simon Leadlay, Head of Product Management at You.i TV , shared thoughts with us on the OTT industry's shift to online video consumption: How is the shift to online video consumption pushing traditional players to adjust strategies? There are two...

As the presence of OTT services has increasingly grown over the past few years, free trials have been an effective tool for these services to engage and acquire customers. These free trials allow potential customers the opportunity to explore a service’s content offering as well as other aspects of the user experience that the free trial period and the user experience are compelling enough to convert those trialing the service to paying customers. Considering how effective free...

Unprecedented changes and market pressures have changed the game for small businesses (SMBs). New needs in a changing work environment, increasing use of technology products and services, and rising security concerns, especially regarding the security of home networks for remote workers, are driving owners to reevaluate their operations. Managing and securing their networks, and their ever-growing portfolio of end-user devices, are top priorities, and they are increasingly turning to ISPs...

The CONNECTIONS Conference is the premier Connected Home conference focused on emerging technology markets in digital media, content distribution, and mobile applications and services. This year' sessions offer its attendees a mix of valuable market research, analysis, and industry insight. During the conference's DIY: Impact on Smart Home and Security session, a  panel of industry experts from across the DIY to Pro-spectrum discussed consumer responses to ever-expanding DIY...

Mark Samuel, CEO of Ezlo Innovation , will be participating on the final CONNECTIONS panel session, Investing in the Future: Smart Home Investment Priorities . Ahead of the panel, he shared his thoughts with us on investing in the future and the long-term impacts of COVID-19: What do you anticipate the impact of COVID-19 to be for the smart home industry in the short term and long term? The short term answer is that for people who can afford it, they’re buying...

Overall adoption of connected home products is increasing each year, but the next five years will see much broader adoption of groundbreaking technologies, such as AI, machine learning, voice control, video analytics, sound recognition, and robotics, that will alter form factors.    As part of the CONNECTIONS Community, Parks Associates analysts will share key forecasts and leads a discussion on factors fueling growth and key investments of connected products and...