The deal breaker with so many smart home systems is tech support: When the thermostat doesn’t work, is it a problem with the home network, the home automation system, the furnace or the thermostat itself? Wink, the newly spun-off division of GE-backed Quirky, thinks it has tech support nailed. No one could be happier than The Home Depot, where Wink launches July 7. “Wink has set up a customer service network for us,” says Home Depot senior merchant Randy Light. “They’ll be working with vendor partners to create a seamless experience for customers.” Since Home Depot carries or will carry a big chunk of devices that attach to Wink, the home-improvement giant better make sure that an $80 home automation hub doesn’t sabotage the consumer experience.
Another day, another product is added to the ever-growing “smart home” industry. Just last week, GE announced a $15 smart LED bulb along with a slew of other “connected” devices from its partnership with invention company Quirky. Still, ask an average person if they’ve heard of Quirky and you might find yourself explaining the concept. Ask the same person if they’ve heard of Home Depot and the reaction would be the complete opposite. To make smart home products more accessible and less confusing for the mass market, Home Depot has teamed up with Quirky-owned Wink to create a line of connected devices that are centralized into one place: The Wink Hub. This $49 hub contains all the techy goodness that puts your “dumb” products on the Web with popular connection protocols: ZigBee, Z-Wave, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, to name a few. All the user has to do is set up the hub, purchase a Wink-certified product and scan the barcode of the item to connect it to your home network. The current Home Depot-Wink line works with a ton of popular home improvement brands, such as Chamberlain (garage door openers), Honeywell (thermostat), Rheem (water heater) and GE (lighting and kitchen appliances).
