Samsung aims to connect all home appliances by 2020

Ramping up efforts to establish a complete smart home environment, Samsung Electronics said Tuesday it would add connectivity to all of its home appliance products by 2020 and provide a control platform.

The announcement was made about a week before the South Korean electronics maker is to unveil its major smart home services at the IFA 2017 in Berlin.

To increase connectivity, the company has decided to add smart functions based on Internet of Things technologies to all household appliances made by Samsung by 2020. 

Current smart appliances, such as the artificial intelligence-based, voice-activated Family Hub 2.0 refrigerator, will have enhanced connections with other devices, serving as the hub of a smart home designed by Samsung.

Under this system, a user would be able to speak to the fridge to activate a vacuum machine to clean the kitchen or start a laundry machine.

Starting from next year, new products will be equipped with IoT technologies certified by the Open Connectivity Foundation, a global alliance of major tech companies seeking standardization of IoT specifications.

The organization set the world’s first standardized IoT specifications, called OCF 1.0, in late June.

Samsung’s smart TV, Family Hub refrigerator and air conditioner products were certified by the OCF. The company plans to have its washing machine, oven range, robot cleaner and air purifier certified within the year.

“Samsung’s aggressive efforts to get OCF certification will encourage others to join the group, expanding the use of the tech standardizations, which will help connect products made by different manufacturers,” the company said in a statement.

Along with efforts to enhance individual products with IoT technologies, Samsung is also spurring efforts to expand the use of Samsung Connect on smartphones, the company’s IoT platform worldwide. Currently, the platform is able to connect and operate about 130 devices.

“Artificial intelligence, voice recognition, cloud and all other IoT technologies will evolve much faster than we expect,” said Koo Seong-ki, vice president of the home appliances division at Samsung. “Samsung will try to reinforce the smart home environment by providing meaningful changes to users’ daily life.”

By Song Su-hyun (song@heraldcorp.com)