The future of the Google Android operating system lies in a technology called Android@Home, a system for tying together home devices via Google-authored protocols and APIs.
Google announced the platform in a keynote address on Monday at Google I/O, where the company opened the conference by announcing a new version of Honeycomb, its next-generation "Ice Cream Sandwich" release, as well as movies, music, and Android accessories.
To date, Android has existed as an operating system for phones, and most recently, tablets. The upcoming "Ice Cream Sandwich" release, due in the fourth quarter, will serve as a unifying release for both the tablet and the phone. Google hasn't said what OS Android@Home will use.
Android@Home, by contrast, will connect a user's Android device to other appliances in the home via a suite of new services that will be released at an undisclosed future time. Examples of this include "Project Tungsten," a wireless speaker system that can be synced via Android, as well as wireless light switches and other appliances. Lighting Science was also named as a partner, and will launch wireless lighting products to support Android@Home.
"We want to think of every device in your home as a connection to Android apps," said Hugo Barra, product management director for Google, in the keynote.
What is Android@Home?
According to Eric Holland, vice president of electrical engineering at Lighting Science, Android@Home will use a new version of a wireless network developed by Google. It will eventually be open sourced, Holland added.
"Google reached out to us, but we were already working on something similar," Holland said. Wireless Science plans five products, including internal lamps and external lighting fixtures that use the technology. They will ship by the end of the year, Holland said.
The network is similar to that used by ZigBee, a low-power wireless network used for short-range home automation. However, the network will be designed to allow for enough bandwidth to transfer video, Holland said. "One of the fixtures we're going to show off next week [at Lightfair, the North American commercial lighting show] will be an external [lighting] fixture with a security camera attached," Holland said.
The network itself will consume "negligible power," compared to the 12 watts of power a typical lamp consumes, Holland said. It will also be low cost, said Joe Britt, Google's engineering director.
Google may also apply Android@Home to smart-grid applications, Britt added.
Project Tungsten
Project Tungsten, by contrast, appears to push the Android@Home network a bit further. A Tungsten device runs the Android OS as well as an Android@Home framework. In the example, Google showed it connected to a home stereo system speakers. Google executives showed Google Music running on the speakers, and said it could be synchronized throughout the home—a shot at the high-end Sonos audio system.
Google executives also showed a CD with an NFC label that could be touched to an Android@Home system. When it connected, the music was added to the library. When touched again, the music started playing. Executives said users should hear more about Android@Home in the next couple of months.
In its present form, Tungsten looks like it will impact Sonos, the wireless speaker system that syncs music across various rooms in a user's house. Although Sonos has released cheaper versions of its hardware, the company is often perceived as a high-margin vendor of audio products—a market into which Google can apparently move. And it wouldn't be the first time; revenue and sales at GPS/PND vendors has declined since Google announced its Google Maps Navigation app in late 2009.
Sonos representatives were not available to comment.
"At Home is going to be huge," said Richard Shim, a mobile analyst for DisplaySearch. "I think it's something that's very ambitious. It's what I like to call the next level. Everyone now has this synchronization of data, where you put it in one place with multiple devices. The next step is controlling these different devices, and no one has been able to crack that nut."
On the surface, Android@Home doesn't seem that new; technologies like DLNA have tried to integrate home appliances via a home network for years, with middling success. According to Shim, however, DLNA companies designed the protocols and integrated the technology on the appliance side, leaving client software and devices to integrate as they chose. Android@Home will provide a unified client as well as the protocol, taking the opposite approach.
"Now it's up to the appliance side to pick it up," Shim said.
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