三星欲得敲门砖 借收购进军智能家居市场
Samsung Electronics is following Google and Apple into the smart home with the acquisition of SmartThings, which allows a variety of internet-connected devices to be controlled by a single mobile app.
继谷歌(Google)和苹果(Apple)之后，三星电子(Samsung Electronics)也通过收购美国公司SmartThings打入智能家居领域。SmartThings能让用户通过一个移动应用来控制各种联网设备。Samsung, which showed off a range of its own “Smart Home” appliances at January’s Consumer Electronics Show, said SmartThings would continue to operate independently but move to Silicon Valley as part of the South Korean company’s Open Innovation Centre.
在今年1月的消费电子展(Consumer Electronics Show)上，三星曾展示过一系列自己的“智能家居(Smart Home)”电器。它表示，SmartThings将继续独立运营，不过会搬到硅谷，成为三星开放创新中心(Open Innovation Centre)的一部分。
Washington DC-based SmartThings raised $15.5m in venture funding after receiving $1.2m from a Kickstarter campaign in September 2012.
SmartThings目前总部位于华盛顿特区。2012年9月，该公司先是在一次Kickstarter众筹活动中获得了120万美元，接着又筹集了1550万美元风险投资。
Samsung’s acquisition of the three-year-old start-up, for a reported $200m, represents another bid by a leading technology company to persuade more consumers that the benefits in convenience or energy-saving of wiring up their homes to the internet outweigh the security risks and additional complexities.
据报道，三星以2亿美元的价格，收购了这家只有3年历史的初创企业。和其他已涉足智能家居领域的高科技企业一样，三星希望说服消费者，将家居设备联网在便利性和节能方面的好处，超过了这么做的安全风险及额外的复杂性。It follows Google’s purchases of Nest, a maker of online thermostats and smoke detectors, and Dropcam, an internet-connected security camera developer, earlier this year. In June, Apple laid the foundation for its own move into the “internet of things” with HomeKit, a way to control heating, door locks or lights with an iPhone.
今年早些时候，谷歌收购了Nest和Dropcam，前者生产能联网的温控装置及烟雾警报器，后者则是一家联网安保摄像头的开发商。今年6月，苹果也为自己向“物联网”的进军打响了第一枪。当时，该公司推出了HomeKit应用，用户可以在iPhone上使用这款应用，控制暖气、门锁或电灯。While Apple has allowed only a select few device makers to work with HomeKit so far and Nest has slowly opened up its developer platform in recent months, Samsung and SmartThings touted their “open platform for the smart home”, which now supports more than 1,000 products and thousands of mobile apps.
到目前为止，苹果只选取了少量设备制造商围绕HomeKit开展合作。而Nest则在最近几个月才缓慢开放了其开发者平台。相比之下，三星和SmartThings则在大力推销它们的“智能家居开放平台”，这一平台目前已支持逾千种产品和数千个应用。David Eun, head of Samsung’s Open Innovation Centre, said that more investments, acquisitions and partnerships around the internet of things were planned.
三星开放创新中心主管戴维•尤恩(David Eun)表示，三星还计划围绕物联网开展更多投资、并购及合作。Samsung’s own Smart Home family of products only worked with its own appliances, such as fridges and washing machines. SmartThings will continue to work with other companies’ products, including those from rivals Google and Apple, after the acquisition, while benefiting from Samsung’s reach and distribution.
三星自己的智能家居产品只支持三星的电器，比如电冰箱和洗衣机。而SmartThings则会在并购之后，在享受三星市场影响范围及分销网络的同时，继续兼容其他公司的产品，包括那些来自三星对手谷歌和苹果的产品。
